Spring Has Arrived!

Well, Spring has sprung and it certainly felt like it today. Gusty southerly winds, abundant sunshine, and temperatures some 20 degrees above normal made for a day more like late Spring than the first day of Spring. Spring is also our wet season and as mentioned in the morning discussion, some lucky locations received generous rainfall Saturday, but most of the state is still too dry. In fact, as you can see from the graphic on the right from the Oklahoma Mesonet, much of the state is in a very serious drought situation, particularly the more western counties.

Monday will also have strong southerly winds, much above normal temperatures, mostly sunny skies and a relative humidity that should drop into the 30% range once again. This all adds up to a dangerous fire weather situation and also leads to high evaporation rates. Evaporation in these kind of conditions can be as much as ¼ inch per day which of course just makes the drought situation that much worse with each passing day.

Any widespread relief is still not in sight although a cool front will be arriving during the late night hours of Tuesday night or more likely into the morning hours of Wednesday. This will bring with it a chance of showers and storms, some potentially severe, but most of the state will still be too dry after it moves on through.

Temperatures will be trending down for the rest of the week, but still at or above normal for the most part. Several other systems will also be coming this way periodically providing at least a chance of showers or storms for Thursday night and again over the weekend. At this point though, I do not see a true drought breaking rainfall event for the state any time soon.

As always, stay tuned and check back for updates.

Dick Faurot