Updated 915am CT – Monday / 8 June 2015
.. A Dry and Stable Weather Pattern For Now ..
.. Temperatures Continue to Slowly Rise as Ground Dries ..
.. Thunderstorm Chances By Mid and Latter Part of the New Week ..
On this Monday…. a weak cold front extends from central Missouri southwestward into extreme northern Oklahoma and into the northern Texas panhandle. Surface high pressure is over the northern Gulf of Mexico and the lower Mississippi Valley. As a result of this surface weather pattern, our local surface winds are southerly.
In the upper levels of the atmosphere.. a high pressure area, acting like a “lid” on the atmosphere, extends north northeastward from northern Mexico across Texas and eastward across the northwest Gulf of Mexico. A trough.. or line.. of low pressure is moving eastward over the Great Lakes States with yet another stronger upper level disturbance well off the Pacific coast west of the southern California coastal waters. As a result, our upper air winds at about 18,500 feet are mostly light and variable.
Little change is seen over the next couple of days across our area with a dry and stable weather pattern prevailing. The upper level high pressure, as pointed out above, is acting like a “lid” on the atmosphere keeping rising motion in the atmosphere at bay.
Another factor to consider is the fact that the ground is slowly drying and that is allowing afternoon high temperatures to rise a bit. As a result, afternoon temperatures, which have been a bit cooler than seasonal averages, will warm back to near seasonal levels over the next few days.
By Wednesday and continuing through the remainder of the week and through our upcoming weekend, our weather pattern will turn a little more unstable as the upper air high pressure area weakens. I’ll introduce a slim chance of afternoon or evening rain showers and thunderstorms Wednesday through Friday with better rain and thunderstorm chances Saturday and Sunday and into the first part of next week. A reminder that frequent cloud-to-ground lightning will accompany any thunderstorms that do develop. National Weather Service rainfall guidance suggests that we have the possibility of 1/4 to 1/2 inch of rain starting Wednesday through early next week.
Have a good Monday….
Meteorologist Troy Kimmel
Contact me:
tkimmel@austin.utexas.edu
http://www.facebook.com/troykimmel