Rainfall reports from early Saturday morning. More waves of rain/storms ahead tonight and Sunday

Published by

Timothy Burr

on

October 9, 2021

We’re in a bit of a lull early this afternoon between the rain some of us saw earlier today, and the next round of rain which will arrive this evening/Overnight.

MRMS radar loop ending 1:30 PM Saturday, October 9, 2021.

We are seeing an area of showers and a few thunderstorms lift NE across parts of northern Minnesota as of mid-afternoon, with dry conditions in the rest of the Northland.

Lots of dynamics with the system moving in for tonight and Sunday including strong winds aloft >120 knots over the southwest U.S. this afternoon, while 500mb winds were ~70 knots over that same area.

An upper level trough continues to pivot south/east across the central Rockies this afternoon, and we should see this trough deepen a bit more since it still has an area of stronger winds aloft on the west side of the trough which will help deepen it a bit more.

Goes-16 water vapor loop from Saturday, October 9, 2021 (ending 1:15 PM CT)

A very diffluent system evident across the Plains on water vapor imagery today.

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Scattered showers and isolated thunderstorms should begin to increase in coverage from SW-NE in the Northland late this afternoon into this evening.

Scattered severe thunderstorms will develop over parts of the eastern Dakotas through late this afternoon with those storms likely lifting ENE across west-central Minnesota this evening. Note: Chances for strong to severe thunderstorms increase over southwest portions of the Northland after 10 PM tonight, this would include the Brainerd Lakes area. The rest of the Northland could see a few strong to severe thunderstorms early Sunday morning, or after Midnight tonight.

The primary severe weather hazards through tonight include damaging wind gusts and large hail, but there is a risk for a few tornadoes late this afternoon into tonight from southeast North Dakota into eastern South Dakota and west-central Minnesota.

Here’s a look at the 17z (12 PM) HRRR model simulated radar forecast ending 6 AM Sunday, October 10, 2021.

HREF model is cranking out some significant amounts of rain over parts of North Dakota into northern Minnesota through Sunday.

HREF QPF max amounts of 3-5″+ over parts of North Dakota, and 1-2″+ over much of northern Minnesota.

HREF model QPF ensemble mean is somewhat less extreme, but still shows a widespread swath of 1-3″+ rain totals from central North Dakota to the Arrowhead of Minnesota through Sunday.

2 responses to “Rainfall reports from early Saturday morning. More waves of rain/storms ahead tonight and Sunday”

Ruth Henriquez

October 10, 2021

OK, this storm was supposed to hit Duluth and it was supposed to rain all last night according to the National Weather Service. But again, as so often over the past few months, the rain did not materialize. Why do they keep telling us we’re almost certainly getting rain and then we don’t?

I do not remember any time in the past 26 years of living in Duluth that the forecasts have been repeatly so wrong, which makes me think there is some new pattern emerging that they are not seeing and accounting for in their forecasts. Last night the storm tracked to the northwest of Duluth, but they had it going east, right at us. This seems to be a pattern. What do you think?

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1. burrweather
  
  October 10, 2021
  
  Hi Ruth! Unfortunately when the computer models are wrong it makes the forecasters look bad, since we use these models as a guide, but those models will never be 100% accurate, and neither will weather forecasts, but by no means am I sticking up for weather forecasters, because I too was disappointed with how little rain we got in Duluth last night, but just using Duluth as an example, the Airport picked up 0.31″ of rain last night, yet the Duluth Harbor only picked up 0.01″, while Superior checked in at 0.05″ of rain. That is a pretty large gradient in totals in such a short distance, those computer models will never be able to narrow in on how tight these precip gradients can be and often are with these systems. I think the storms last night tracked more north-northeast than expected, vs. easterly, which the models missed, and once that happened it messed up the rainfall forecasts in model guidance. Honestly, I think our weather pattern around here for well over a year now has been pretty messed up, just seems like its been odd more times than not, maybe it’s happened before, but I’ve really noticed a change say over the last 1-2 years in this area.
  
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Rainfall reports from early Saturday morning. More waves of rain/storms ahead tonight and Sunday

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2 responses to “Rainfall reports from early Saturday morning. More waves of rain/storms ahead tonight and Sunday”

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