6:21 PM Tuesday, August 22, 2023
A strong warm front lifted north into central Minnesota into central Wisconsin this afternoon, but this boundary likely won’t be able to move much farther north from its present location late this afternoon. Extreme heat and humidity south of this warm front today, with much cooler temperatures farther north of the warm frontal boundary and expect a similar temperature setup to occur Wednesday with the most intense heat remaining south of the Northland.
With such a large temperature contrast over the region and a persistent humid onshore flow coming off Lake Superior this will continue to lead to fog and drizzle at times near Lake Superior and in the Twin Ports tonight through early Thursday morning.
At 5 PM today the temperature was 70 at Moose Lake, MN while it was 99 at Cambridge, MN — The distance between those 2 cities is roughly 70 miles.
Extremely high dew points remain over the upper Midwest today with widespread dew points in the 70s in central and southern Minnesota and western and central Wisconsin with even a few 80s mixed in as well.
Heat index or feels like temperatures across central and southern Minnesota ranged from around 100 to as high as 115 this afternoon.
500mb heights have come down slightly from a peak of 601 decameters Monday afternoon to around 599 decameters this afternoon near the center of the upper level high (blue H on map)
A large upper-level ridge continues to sit over the Midwest today with a ring of fire pattern in place where we have rain going up and around the upper ridge.
Goes-16 water vapor loop from Tuesday, August 22, 2023 (loop time ends 4:50 PM CT)
There is a lot of energy or CAPE in the air today with elevated CAPE pushing 6000 J/kg over eastern Minnesota and western Wisconsin this afternoon, but very warm temperatures aloft or a cap will prevent thunderstorms from developing in most of the Northland tonight and Wednesday.
The NAM 3km model (shown below) does fire up some thunderstorms tonight over Lake Superior and possibly along parts of the North Shore into far northern Wisconsin (Bayfield Peninsula area) but this is highly conditional on the cap breaking enough to allow thunderstorms to develop north/east of Duluth tonight. If a storm can develop, then it could become strong to severe with hail being the primary threat tonight.
Note — Otherwise, the next few days look mostly dry in much of the Northland with scattered coverage showers and isolated thunderstorms possible on Friday the way it looks now.
Thunderstorms early today never really got going until they moved out over Lake Superior, far northern Wisconsin into parts of upper Michigan. The highest rain totals early today ended up farther east than expected, setting up along the Wisconsin-upper Michigan state line where an inch or more of rain fell per radar estimates and reports.
Rainfall Reports from Tuesday morning, August 22, 2023
Source: MesoWest
Ashland, WI: 0.38″
Isabella, MN: 0.36″
French River, MN: 0.34″
Poplar, WI: 0.33″
Duluth Airport: 0.20″
Duluth Sky Harbor Airport: 0.08″
Solon Springs, WI: 0.07″
McGregor, MN: 0.05″
Two Harbors, MN: 0.03″
Superior Airport: 0.01″
Thanks for reading!
Tim
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