Warming Up Soon

We're off to some warmer air for the next several days, despite a weak front that will enter the region tomorrow keeping us in the mid 70s.  One or two scattered storms will be possible Thursday near and just north of the boundary, but this probability remains rather low for most of the area.  The chances will be confined to areas along and north of highway 412.  Slightly higher chances will be confined to SE Kansas and extreme NE OK.  

 Speaking of low probabilities, we did see a few isolated showers yesterday afternoon across extreme northeastern OK as the cold air aloft associated with an upper level trough moved across the region.

That trough is well east, but we're not finished with the active weather by a long shot.

 The upper air pattern will be transitioning to a northwest flow aloft this weekend before moving back to a southwest flow pattern early next week. This will result in warmer than normal temperatures, gusty winds, and a few scattered storm chances in the 20% range. I mentioned the northwest flow issues yesterday for the weekend including a signal for a morning complex of storm activity Saturday morning.  I'll keep watching this area for the next few days, but the actual model output is very low for this time period. The flow at 500 millibars doesn't take much to spark off convection this time of year in a northwest flow. 

 But its next week that we'll crank the pattern back up into a severe weather pattern with a big system around Wednesday or Thursday.  Bufkit profiles indicate very high cape values by Tuesday and Wednesday.  The surface wind will be from the south and southeast gusting from 15 to 30 mph.  This will bring increasing low level moisture back into the region and setting the stage for another potential severe weather episode next week.  Stay tuned.

Next:

If you are a parent, try this on for size:  depending upon your school district, you have either 15 to 25 days left before summer vacation begins!

Vacation is a strange concept.  It's strange because I don't take a lot of vacations.  It's not that I don't have vacation days available, because I do.  I think it's mainly my conservative " if you don't have cash, don't spend it" attitude that really pulls me back.  We took a big trip about 3 years ago and our kids absolutely loved it.  I don't know exactly what we'll be able to do this summer, but hopefully I can get the family into a different county or two!