Dick Faurot's Weather Blog: Heat Returns

Quite a rain footprint over the last 24 hours, and the last 48 hours, as you can see on the first two maps, courtesy of the OK Mesonet.

Once again, some locations received too much rain too fast and there were some associated run-off issues, but at least most of the state has received some very useful rainfall over the course of the last two days. For this time of year, to get that much rainfall statewide and not be associated with some sort of tropical system is rather unusual to say the least.

All that moisture also helps to keep our daytime temperatures at least somewhat in check in the days ahead when the sun comes back in full force and things start heating back up. At least the clouds and rains of the last couple of days have provided a brief break in the heat, but not for much longer.

Notice the max/min temperature map for today, for example, but daytime highs will return to near normal levels on Thursday, which means around the 94 or 95-degree mark. Also, the combination of heat and humidity will push heat index values back into triple digits for the rest of the week, through the coming weekend, and into next week as well. In fact, heat index values may once again approach dangerous levels as they could be as high as 105-110 or so.

As you can see on our forecast page, there will be little or no mention of any additional rainfall after tonight or into the morning hours of Thursday as high-pressure ridging aloft once again builds back over the state.

However, there will be another chance of showers & storms for tonight and into the morning hours, primarily for the more northern and NE counties of the state. After that, we expect to have partly cloudy skies for the rest of the day along with light SE winds.

The following days will have even more sunshine along with light southerly winds, so daytime temperatures will continue to climb, but the wet soils and green vegetation should keep us below triple digit territory.

Eventually, things will start to dry out going into next week, but the ridge aloft is also expected to be rather transitory over us and set up further west by later in the week. With that in mind, the 6-10-day outlook calls for an above normal chance of additional moisture but also above normal temperatures.

Also, that trend may well extend into August and will have more about that in Thursday’s blog.

So, stay tuned and check back for updates.

Dick Faurot