Increasing Chances of Showers/Storms.

As mentioned yesterday, today marks the beginning of Summer from a climatological perspective and this was certainly a warm start to our summer.   The temperature range for today has been 87/66 as compared to the normal values of 83/64.  Notice the max/min temperatures across the state so far today on the map, courtesy of the OK Mesonet.

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Also, a few showers/storms have managed to develop with the daytime heating and with the very weak wind flow aloft, those storms move very little, drop locally heavy rains, and then fall apart.  Since the daytime heating is a contributing factor in their development, then we expect things to settle down tonight with fair to partly cloudy overnight skies and a light SE breeze.  Temperatures will drop into the mid-upper 60s by morning and we should have a dry start to our day.

However, as we go through Friday and Saturday, conditions aloft will be more supportive of showers/storms some of which may linger into the overnight hours.  As was the case today, they will be slow movers so if you happen to be underneath one, expect a brief but heavy downpour.  Also, this is not a significant severe weather scenario due to a very weak wind pattern aloft, but cannot rule out that a few may reach minimal severe criteria with small hail and locally damaging winds.  The chances of any one location receiving measurable rainfall will be ramping up on Friday but Saturday still looks to have the best chance and then tapering off during the day Sunday.  Even so, that does not mean any of those days will be a complete rain-out as the showers/storms will still be on a scattered basis and will be rather short-lived.

This also means we will have more cloud cover which will impact temperatures with low-mid 80s during the day and mid-upper 60s at night along with a light southerly breeze.  By Monday, a weak boundary looks to have moved through the state bringing somewhat drier but not really much in the way of cooler air back over the state.  As a result, we should have more sunshine and a light N/NE breeze for Mon/Tue with those winds returning to a more southerly direction for Wed/Thu.  As you can see on our forecast page, there will be some impacts on temperatures during that time frame but in general we look to be at or above normal for the most part for much of next week.

Notice the 8-14 day outlook which takes us into the middle of June has the state running pretty close to normal with respect to temperature and precipitation.

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However, the overall outlook for the entire month suggests June will average somewhat cooler and wetter than normal.

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So, stay tuned for updates.

Dick Faurot