Protect Your Tender Plants Tonight.

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After a sunny, mild day today our northerly winds will be calming down tonight as a ridge of high pressure settles over the state.  The cool, dry air associated with that system together with clear skies overnight will result in maximum radiational cooling and temperatures will be falling into the 30s for many locations.  For that reason, a frost advisory has been issued and any tender vegetation will need protection for tonight.  Some of the normally cooler valley locations could even briefly drop to the freezing mark.

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As you can see, temperatures this morning were on the chilly side as well but there was enough of a breeze that only a few patches of frost have been reported for today and the sunny skies did allow for a nice rebound this afternoon.  Here in Tulsa, the max/min so far has been 67/39.  Click here for the normal and record values for this date or any other date for that matter.

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After the cold start to Friday morning, we will have lots of sunshine throughout the day and our winds will be returning to a more SE direction and starting to pick up to around 10 to 16 mph during the afternoon hours.  That should get us back up to near the 70 degree mark for a daytime high which is a bit above normal.  It will be much warmer though through the weekend as strong, gusty southerly winds return for Sat/Sun in advance of the next storm system.  Those southerly winds will keep us from cooling much at night and morning lows will be in the 50s Saturday morning and in the 60s Sunday morning.  Although clouds will be on the increase, we should still have enough sunshine for daytime highs to make it to near 80 or perhaps even some lower 80s on Saturday but a more persistent stratus deck will likely keep us in the 70s on Sunday.

The timing of the next storm system still looks to be primarily a Sunday night event with potentially some showers/storms lingering into the more southern counties through Monday morning.  The amount of instability is questionable but once again there will be very strong dynamics in place so there will be at least the possibility of a few severe storms for the Sunday night time frame, and right now it appears to be primarily a wind/hail threat.  As you can see on the preliminary storm zone outlook, the more northern counties look to have the greater risk of severe storms and that is because the main upper level storm system will be passing by further north than the last one did.

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After that, northerly winds for most of the day Monday should cool things off at least somewhat as you can see on our forecast page.  This does not appear to be a particularly strong cold front and the actual boundary will likely stall out along the Red River or into N TX Monday night or Tuesday.  That means the low level moisture will not have been scoured out all the way down to the Gulf of Mexico as has been the case today.  I mention that because another storm system will be heading our way by the middle of the week and it should have more moisture to work with. The timing is still uncertain but the longer range guidance has come around to a more consistent solution and will be spreading another chance of showers/storms this way from the west starting late Wednesday or Wednesday night and more likely into the day Thursday.  Far to early to speculate on the severe potential, but this is April. Notice the 7 day QPF is also picking up on a wetter signal with most of the rains Sunday night and Monday likely to be over the more eastern counties but the mid-week system could turn out to be very wet for much of the state.

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As you can also see on the 8-14 day outlook,a wet signal extending through Easter weekend is looking more likely as there appear to be a number of storm systems stacked up out in the Pacific which will be coming this way every few days.  Could get interesting as we get further into April.  The longer range guidance continues to favor above normal temperatures as well.

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So, stay tuned and check back for updates.

Dick Faurot