Good Wednesday to one and all. It’s super windy and it’s super mild as we close out the month of October. This mild wind is ahead of a cold front sweeping into the region from the northwest, bringing some showers and storms across Kentucky on Halloween.
Winds out there today through Thursday can gust to between 30mph and 40mph at times, especially across western and central parts of the state.
Our cold front is now moving through the Plains toward the Mississippi Valley and is spawning strong to severe storms in those areas. The front won’t be quite as active as it moves into our region on Halloween, but it has the chance to bring a few strong to severe storms to the western half of the state.
The Storm Prediction Center even has the low-end threat for severe storms on the Halloween Severe Weather Outlook…
High wind is the primary player with these storms in the west.
The timing of the line of showers and storms will impact trick or treat hours for much of the state, especially central and western Kentucky. Here’s a rough outline showing where the greatest threat for rain is from 6pm-8pm on Halloween…
Most areas will pick up on some much-needed rainfall through Friday morning with some streaks of .50″-1″ rains showing up in a few areas. The models see this, but they disagree on where those streaks are…
Temps behind this front are pretty much near normal for the first day of November on Friday, but that doesn’t last too long. Another surge of above normal temps surges back in late in the weekend and early next week. There is the chance for a shower or two this weekend, especially north and west, but this looks fairly scattered at the moment.
A much stronger system looks to sweep into the region late Election Day and into Wednesday, with the models having their usual timing and intensity issues from this far out. Still, some pretty good thunderstorms will be possible along and ahead of this front.
Another system may drop in behind that later in the week. Here’s the GFS…
The Canadian isn’t too far off from that…
Here’s the EURO…
The AI run of the EURO is more active than the operational run…
I’m gonna keep saying this, but much of what happens over the next few weeks depends a lot on how things play out in the tropics. The National Hurricane Center continues to watch for development in the Caribbean…
As if you didn’t already know, the operational models have wildly different ideas with whatever pops down here.
As we head into November, the overall weather pattern is about to really crank, and I have concerns about a busy second severe weather season. The EURO Weeklies are going toward a much wetter pattern for our region.
The Control Run is extremely active…
The mean of the EURO Weeklies comes from around 100 or so members and also has an active setup…
Have a great day and take care.
Thanks Chris. Sounds like tomorrow will be a ” blow torch. ” Continuing weakening low pressure with the cold front is not going to give us the rain we need. Anything that developes in the Tropics will only ” lock in ” what we have now. I just hope that the severe weather you mentioned will not be the ” opposite reaction ” to this current long playing weather pattern.
After that, try and make it a great day everyone.
The high temperature of 82 degrees on Tuesday at Chicago’s O’Hare Airport shattered the previous record high for the date of 78 set in 1999. It reached 81 degrees at the NWS Office in the SW suburbs. Strong southerly winds gusted between 30 and 40 MPH, as the much-above normal October continues. We have had five 80+ degree days for the month, with another likely on the way later today. The normal high this time of year here is only 57 degrees.
Despite the dry weather, with only a little over an inch of rain for the month, the fall colors have been spectacular. It’s made for great hiking in the forest preserve near me with the warm temps, dry weather, and the leaves changing colors.
Mike, My area of Kentucky has received 0.00 inches of rain in October. It has been beautiful weather though for recreation only. The Autumn colors on my property came out well at first, and now are beginning to brown and fall only add fuel to the potential forest fires in parts of the state.