Warm today, storms return tomorrow

Tomorrow, the weather pattern shifts to a much more active one as the first of two fronts that will affect our weather will push into the region from the northwest. This first front has produced some rough weather to our northwest, and it will trigger some storms in our region as well.

For us, the chances for severe weather are nearly zero, however. Our real concern isn’t severe weather; it’s flooding. As usual, there will be plenty of moisture for the storms to work with, and rainfall totals will be high enough to cause ponding water on roadways and standing water in low-lying spots. The Weather Prediction Center continues to have most of the area in a Marginal Risk (a 5 to 15% chance) for heavy enough rain to cause flash flooding.

Highs tomorrow will still be warm with some peeks of sunshine between the storms. We’ll top out in the mid-80s. Lows tomorrow night will be even warmer than tonight due to the cloud cover, and will be in the mid-60s.

The chance for rain lasts into Friday, with the main forecast question regarding our football games being the position of the front. The current thinking is that the front will clear most of the area by kickoff, with the best chances for a rainy start to the games in the southern and eastern areas.

Friday will be a bit cooler than Thursday as the air on the backside of the front will be slightly cooler; we’ll see highs right around 80 degrees.

The front will clear the area on Saturday, and the start of the weekend will be nice. Showers and storms return by the afternoon as a secondary low approaches from the west. Temperatures go up slightly on Sunday as a warm front pushes through, but the cold front moves in quickly on its heels and then stalls out just off to the south. The front will continue to produce rain for the rest of the forecast. With this front also to our south, high temperatures will drop into the mid-to-upper 70s by next Tuesday.