Hot & Humid, Only A Few Cooling Showers

Been on vacation for the past week; sure glad to see we caught a good rain this past weekend, at least for some folks as you can see on the 3 day rainfall map, courtesy of the OK Mesonet.  Obviously, our summer time rains can be very spotty but can also be locally quite heavy where they do occur.  That will be the case again for tonight into the day Tuesday with only some isolated showers or storms expected, but if you happen to be under one of them they can drop some decent rainfall in a short period of time. 

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We also got a little break in the heat today due to the extra cloud cover as you can see on the max/min temperature map.  Most of NE OK only made it into the upper 80s to lower 90s this afternoon.

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By Wednesday, even fewer showers/storms are expected and Thursday looks to be dry before we get a pattern change going into the coming weekend as you can see on our forecast page.  The variable cloud cover for Tuesday will keep temperatures somewhat in check but with more sunshine expected on Wed/Thu, those look to be the hottest days of this forecast cycle. That should translate into mid-upper 90s for Tuesday and upper 90s to near 100 for Wed/Thu for our daytime highs.  However, keep in mind the dew point will remain in the 70s so the abundant low level moisture will push those heat index values well into triple digit territory and heat advisories will likely be an issue.

Those high dew points will also keep us from cooling off much at night, particularly for the urban environment where the concrete and asphalt also contributes to the warmer nights.  At any rate, overnight lows will be in the mid-upper 70s to near 80 next few days.  In other words, still very summer-like for much of this week.

But, as mentioned above, a pattern change aloft is projected to push a cool front our way and it should be reaching us late in the day Friday.  That means another hot, humid day on Friday before the front arrives and the boundary will also bring with it a chance of late day showers/storms.  Saturday looks to be the best day for rain during this forecast cycle and along with that comes a break in the heat due to mostly cloudy skies and a more NE surface wind.  Daytime highs will likely be confined to the 80s and the NE surface winds will bring drier low level air back our way.

That will allow our nights to cool off by Sunday and Monday morning with the outlying areas likely dropping into the 60s and the urban area near 70.  Lots more sunshine for the Sun/Mon time frame will push those daytime highs back into the low 90s, but that is still below normal.  By the way, the normal values for the max/min for this time of year is 94/73 for Tulsa.

Looking beyond that time frame, the break in the heat should extend through the 6-10 day time period as the outlooks suggests temperatures averaging a bit below normal.  As for precipitation, the 7 day QPF map suggests a chance of decent rainfall with an inch or so possible.

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So, stay tuned and check back for updates.

Dick Faurot