Improving Temperatures Soon

Tuesday, March 10th 2015, 4:17 am

By: Alan Crone

The system that brought the rain and cooler air to the state yesterday is exiting the eastern OK region early this morning.   A few showers may persist for the next few hours or so, but the system will move out of the state soon.   Clouds will be decreasing later this afternoon from the west to the east with some afternoon sunshine and highs moving into the lower or mid-60s.   Our weather pattern looks good regarding temperatures for the rest of the week despite a mid-level feature developing over the state soon.   Temperatures will continue to slowly warm with highs today in the 60s and moving into the lower 70s Wednesday.

The upper level pattern will remain unchanged in the short term with a split-flow regime characterized by the northern stream well removed to the north.   The southern stream will be active but low level moisture will be shunted south and east of the state for the short term.

Most data support a mid-level trough developing over Oklahoma and the southern plains during the next 24 to 36 hours.   A surface area of low pressure will form along the Texas Gulf Coast region and move northeast as early as Thursday, or as late as Friday and Saturday.   As the mid-level trough ejects eastward and the surface system moves east, some moisture will attempt to move eastward into far eastern OK and western Arkansas Friday and Saturday.   We'll keep a slight chance of showers in the forecast for extreme eastern OK Friday and Saturday. This morning, the NAM is throwing knuckle balls and indicating the surface low will move northward into eastern OK Thursday.   If this is the case, we'll need to add some pops for Thursday.   At this point, I'm inclined to keep Thursday precip free.

Temperatures during this period will remain mild.   Lows in the 40s will be followed by highs in the mid to upper 60s Friday into the weekend.

Next week the upper air pattern will change as a northwest flow will brush the central plains.   Another cold front will move southward out of Canada early next week, but the trajectory in the data keeps most, it not all of the colder air to the northeast of the state for most of next week.   A boundary will cross the state Monday night.

Thanks for reading the Tuesday Morning weather Discussion and blog.

Have a super great day!

Alan Crone

KOTV