Well after a spectacular last couple of days, the air is coming out of our good weather balloon. Today is OK, there are a few sprinkles/light showers in the region, that continue to fall apart in the drier air in the bottom part of the atmosphere, however the changes aloft will start to overwhelm this drier surface air later this evening through lunch tomorrow and we're probably going to see some good soaking rains move into the area and once the rain arrives it may be quite some time before we get 2 straight dry days again as things get much wetter in this part of the country.

The storm that's going to play havoc with is for a couple of days is located in the Western part of the country. It's sitting and spinning around now and will eventually break into a few pieces as it mostly moves towards the NW of here through FRI. What this will do is tonight help to establish a low level jetstream about 5K feet above the ground. This get will be poking right towards us A.M. tonight through daybreak tomorrow. This will result in rising air aloft that will form into t/storms that will move through the area with some locally heavy rainfall. They'll have a tendency to regenerate during the AM tomorrow and continuously move through for a few hours so even tomorrow AM may be wet at times. Typically these things rapidly fade near lunch, of not before and we should dry out for the PM tomorrow afternoon. Highs should be squelched because of this. Probably only in the 60s.

Then Friday will be iffy for a different reason, and it should be noted that there will be plenty of dry hours throughout the next 5 days, so you will be able to do some things outdoors, you'll just have to pick and choose your activities a bit in between bouts of rainfall. The Upper Level Storm will be a bit closer to us, in the Western Plains. This means that the air aloft will continue to support t/storms at times since it will be rising. Also, the atmosphere will be uncapped, so there will be nothing to keep the storms from really forming. There will at times be little disturbances that move our way irritating the airmass that will be warm and humid. So the ingredients are certainly there for additional storms through SAT AM. There may be a break SAT PM-SUN...we'll wait and see about that.

Then another storm will move through the region next TUE...meaning more rainfall, perhaps some severe weather as well.

While random severe weather reports of hail/winds can't be ruled out tonight or FRI...nothing widespread is expected into the weekend. Warm and Humid weather will continue through TUE, before breaking sometime WED perhaps.

Meanwhile folks are starting to buzz about the lack of severe weather this May...it is interesting for sure to see the dramatic differences between last month's records (history setting) achievements and really not much for what is the most active month of the year on average. It will get a bit busier for chasers, there are some nice surface indicators for the folks in the SW Plains states to be alert for for the next couple of days, but at least to me, it seems the next couple of days are isolated type events rather than widespread type things. Next week's storm does look more energetic and potentially more interesting along those lines however. Take a look at the stats through yesterday AM...click to enlarge that image. There were 5 reports yesterday and I believe one today in MD so you can add a few to that May total.

So speaking of April in a way...look at what I just stumbled upon. It's a cool animation of the entire month of April with the Tornado reports as the cyclones moved on through. This is pretty neat!

Have a great rest of the week and I'll see you again on Saturday!

Joe

From summer to a return of more late fall type weather. We were near 90 for a couple of days...and now highs may struggle to get to 60 or so for a couple of days and another chilly for the season airmass gets ready to move into the area. You can see the chill on the 2PM surface map out to the west...

The chillier air across the western plains will arrive towards tomorrow morning. As a result highs tomorrow with lots of clouds expected are going to be in the 55-60 range and perhaps even chillier in the PM hours with showers in the area. The moisture may have a tough time getting scoured out after it arrives. So while some sun is expected, clouds may be the predominate weather over the weekend and with the chillier air aloft moving through the region, and also at the surface, highs are going to struggle all weekend.

From Monday on next week...the weather may be VERY nice for a few days, perhaps still a bit below average, but MON-THU could be real gems with highs in the 60s/70s and lows in the 40s/50s. At this point no significant rainfall,a side from whatever happens tomorrow is expected for awhile.

Meanwhile for the rest of the day today, our storm chances seem pretty small at this point. Can't rule something out but the higher chances appear to be closer to the surface low. The SPC has issued a Tornado Watch for parts of N KS and S NE for the rest of the afternoon and early evening...

Take a look at the radar loop from the Plains states to get an idea where the storms are going to move...basically they'll be swirling around the upper level low which is spinning across the Plains states. Here is a link to the Radar Loop

Now look at the visible satellite picture with clouds rapidly moving from S>N up the State Line into the metro area....

Along the back end of that cloud cover from Topeka southwards is an area that will need to be watched. There is some weak convergence there and some of our extremely short range models are showing the potential for at least some scattered convection to boil up.

Have a great Friday and I'll update the blog again this weekend.

Joe