Good morning NBC Action Weather Bloggers,
Suddenly it is dry! We have had no measurable since May 10th, so today is our 11th dry day in a row. The wettest time of the year is mid-May to mid-June where we average around 6 inches of rain during this stretch. The only other dry spell we had in this year's pattern is when the LRC was just establishing itself in late October & November when we had a 25 day dry spell. The long fall dry spell lasted from October 27 through November 20th, and we issued our winter forecast on November 16th. I was concerned another long dry spell would hit during this weather pattern and mentioned it in the winter forecast special, but it didn't reappear until now. It is much more likely to have dry weather in the late fall, and very difficult to have a long dry spell in the climatologically wettest time of the year, which we are in right now. We will be testing the dry spell tonight as there is a warm front setting up to our south. This set up for tonight is a strange one, as we are really in the middle of a ridge.
Severe thunderstorms are possible over the western plains later this week. Hopefully nothing like this will even come close to happening and if there are any tornadoes let's keep them over the wheat fields of western Kansas and away from communities. The following two pictures are from the Picher, Oklahoma tornado earlier this month. The tornado was on the ground for two hours and a 74 mile track.
Have a great morning. Brett Anthony will get you updated on NBC Action News at 11 AM this morning. After the new data comes out we will analyze the set-up and do another blog this afternoon with maps and showing rainfall potential. And, tonight at 6 and 10 PM we will have our first lake forecast of the season on NBC Action News, and we will be tracking the developments on ESP radar, and Powercast, our new HD in house computer model.
Gary