Friday, April 12th, 2024 Afternoon Forecast
Friday Night: Clear. Low: 45°F
Saturday: Few afternoon clouds but mostly sunny. High: 81°F
Saturday Night: Mostly clear. Low: 60°F
Sunday: Mostly sunny. High: 83°F
Sunday Night: Partly Cloudy. Low: 60°F
=============================================================================
General Discussion:
The weekend has arrived and it is bringing summer like weather for us to enjoy. High temperatures will be in the 80’s along with dry conditions are expected for most of the weekend. Temperatures approaching record highs (89°F) for this weekend. Those conditions combined with gusty winds has elevated the fire danger for a large portion of Missouri and western Illinois this weekend.
-Ebert
=============================================================================
Forecasters: Ebert, Collier
Date Issued: 04/12/2024 5:00 PM CDT
Technical Discussion:
In the upper atmosphere, the jet stream across our area will begin to shift from a northwestly component to a more zonal flow aloft. There is a large ridge to the west of Missouri that will be moving over our area tonight causing the calm weather that we are expecting for this weekend. The system that gave us rain this past week has moved off to our Northeast taking all the moisture with it, leaving the upper atmosphere dry for the remainder of the forecast period. In the lower atmosphere, winds will be from the Northwest for today associated with a high pressure system that is to our south over the Gulf of Mexico area. These winds and high pressure will leave our area dry and calm for the rest of the day.
For Saturday, the upper level winds will shift to more westerly component. Some low level moisture is shown moving though area mid-day which can create a few mid-level clouds Saturday. As this happens, the ridge over our area will continue to move over us to the east and the lower level winds will shift form the Northwest to more Southwest. There will also be a large amount of warm air advection occurring Saturday raising temperatures around 15 degrees higher than Friday’s temperatures which were in the mid-60s. With lower relative humidity values and surface wind gusts approaching 30 mph Saturday afternoon, there is an elevated fire risk, so avoid all outdoor burning.
More of the same in the upper atmosphere for Sunday with strong riding across the central CONUS. An area of low pressure system will begin to form off to our west over the California/Nevada area that future forecasters should track for our area early next week. In the lower atmosphere, winds are southwesterly for most of the day and then shift to the east-southeast Sunday night. The GFS and Nam has some disagreement on some moisture entering our area Sunday afternoon. The GFS model shows at 850 mb, a large amount of moisture showing up over Missouri early Sunday afternoon and sticking around into Monday morning. The NAM model shows very little moisture coming into Missouri and only for a very short amount of time. Soundings agreed with the NAM model and shows that mid-level clouds can be expected over the area from 21Z to 0Z. Temperatures will continue to stay warm for the beginning of the work week and rain chances should increase, especially for Tuesday.
-Ebert