Excessive Rainfall threat. New system in the Plains today......moves east the next few days.

Current Day 1 Forecast

Day 1 Threat Area in Text Format  

Current Day 2 Forecast

Day 3 forecast below

Severe Storm Risk.  Hit the map for full screen.  

https://www.spc.noaa.gov/products/outlook/

Current Day 1 Outlook
Current Day 2 Outlook
Current Day 3 Outlook
Current Day 4-8 Outlook

High Temperatures today and Sunday.  Hottest in the West again.

Dew points. 70+ on this scale makes it feel uncomfortable(sticky air)!  Humid over the eastern half of the country............ providing high precipitable water to use for rains the next 4 days.

Heat and high humidity COMBINED. Feels like temperature. Feeling sultry in much of the country.

Highs days 3-7.

Heat in the West again, just not as intense.

Pleasant from the Plains to Midwest to East.

How do these days 3-7 temperatures compare to average at this time of year?  We are now 4 weeks past the climatological time of year when temperatures are the hottest.

Hot West.  Cool/average from the Central Plains and points east/southeast.

High temperature departures:

Low Temperature Departures:

Old Weather system in the East to Southern Plains, new one emerging in the Plains today.

https://weather.com/maps/currentusweather

Here is the latest radar image:

http://www.nws.noaa.gov/radar_tab.php

Satellite picture. 

Rains the past 24 hours.    Alot of it in the Northeast and South......and Rockies.

You can go to this link to see rain totals from recent time periods:

https://water.weather.gov/precip/

Go to precipitation, then scroll down to pick a time frame. Hit states to get the borders to see locations better. Under products, you can hit "observed" or "Percent of normal"

Missouri  to S.Plains was in horrible shape......the map below shows massive improvement in the S.Plains. Still a dry pocket e.KS/MO.

Wet from NE/w.IA/sw.MN more rains coming there.

Below are rains compared to average of the last 7, 14, 30 and 60 days. Usually not updated for previous day until late the next day.

https://www.atmos.illinois.edu/~snodgrss/Ag_Wx.html

Drought Monitor. This product is updated every Thursday. Drought will be shrinking.

            http://droughtmonitor.unl.edu/Maps/CompareTwoWeeks.aspx    

Temperature Anomalies from GFS ensembles(fairly reliable product) going out 2 weeks. These maps show the Northern Hemisphere. The map of the US is front center. Look for the state borders in  white.

Today:  Hot in the West but not AS hot as recent days.....slug of heat briefly crosses the the N.Plains.  Most places near average.  

In 5+ days:

Hot along the West Coast......spilling into N.Plains.  Cool surge Midwest diving southeast!

In 10+ days   Warmest West again!!!! Heat moving east..... ..positive anomalies across the country...........warmer than Thursday, similar to yesterday!!!

Day 15 Warmest West. Heat across much of the country......warmer than Thursday........similar to Friday.

Latest 0z run of the Canadian model ensembles..........for late week 2.

Heat ridge potential looking LESS impressive today for East/Southeast! Very strong, buckling jet stream location uncertain but that will tell us where the heat ridge will be towards the end of week 2.

The top map is the ensemble average, the maps below are the individual members that make up the average.

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Each member is like the parent, Canadian model operational model.......with a slight tweek/variation in parameters. Since we know the equations to represent the physics of the atmosphere in the models are not perfect, its useful to vary some of the equations that are uncertain(can make a difference) to see if it effects the outcome and how.

The average of all these variations(ensembles) often yields a better tool for forecasting. It's always more consistent. The individual operational model, like each individual ensemble member can vary greatly from run to run.........and represent an extreme end of the spectrum at times. The ensemble average of all the members, because it averages the extremes.............from opposite ends of the spectrum............changes much less from run to run.

360h GZ 500 forecast valid on Sep 2, 2018 00UTC

Forecasts for global GEM, control (GEM 0) and the 20 ensemble members

The low skill, longer range CFS model for weeks 3 and 4.

Upper level ridge Canadian Rockies?

Dry downstream Midwest/East?

Check in tomorrow to read something different............."low skill" (-:

Precip below:

By cfdr - Aug. 15, 2018, 10:54 p.m.            

Once again, thanks, mike.  We're still up here in Terrace - plan to be here for another four weeks or so.  Not that I like the forecasts for this area - fires are really bad, and the only road in here goes through some areas that are burning up.  The models do not look like they show any change in this persistent pattern.

At least it hasn't affected the fish - the river fresh sockeye on the grill are just outstanding.

I appreciate the reports - even if they don't show what I would like them to show.

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                By metmike - Aug. 15, 2018, 10:59 p.m.            

You're very welcome cfdr!

Always great to hear from you and glad the fish are biting.

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                By mcfarm - Aug. 16, 2018, 7:12 a.m.            

Mike, we got nearly an inch of rain yesterday. Although too late {as the crops are ahead of schedule} to do much good I'm sure they helped some. The grass looks better already this morning. Combine that with a 20
China rumor rally and this day is  starting fine.

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                By WxFollower - Aug. 17, 2018, 3:35 p.m.            

Mike,

 Great call on the warmer later in week 2!

 Wow, going even further with Mike’s repeated great calls regarding hotter toward the end of August: today’s 12Z/18Z model consensus for week 2, which now covers ~8/26-9/2, is suggesting to me a shot at record heat in the Midwest and NE US! I don’t know if this would have significantly implications for the crops, but this would result in a relatively small weekly injection for NG for the week ending 8/31. With NG’s August 10th EIA working gas storage at its lowest since way back in 2003, this would likely have significant implications for it. I’m going to take a look at the historic data for late August/early Sept and see what the hottest weeks were. The hottest week for this summer so far is 96 CDD with the 93 CDD for the week ending 8/10/18 being 2nd. I’m confident it wouldn’t get back to 93 as that is hot even for midsummer, but an 85-90 CDD EIA week is looking increasingly possible, which would be well above even the 10 year normal for that late in the season by then.

 Another thought: this pattern progged for week 2 is one with E US ridging, which would not allow for easy recurving offshore of any tropical cyclone should one then happen to exist just off the SE coast of the US. Fortunately, though we’re approaching the seasonal peak, the tropics are very (eerily) quiet for now with nothing significant progged to form or move to near that potentially dangerous position. However, should something unexpectedly develop, it would need to be watched carefully for the CONUS. Remember that some overall quiet past seasons had one bad storm in the wrong place.