A frontal boundary acting more like a stationary front extending from central South Dakota to northeast Minnesota will be the focal point for showers and thunderstorms tonight into Wednesday morning.
Precipitable water of 1.5 to 2 inches near and south of this front will lead to torrential downpours tonight, while the possibility of storms moving over the same location for a few hours is also present. Where this happens, flooding could develop overnight into Wednesday morning.
Some storms could turn severe tonight across the southern parts of the Northland, mainly from east-central Minnesota into northwest Wisconsin, with hail and strong winds being the main threats.
There are still some north-south discrepancies in the forecasts for where the heaviest rain will fall tonight, with the HREF showing it a bit farther south compared to the RAP and other models.
In the main rain corridor, totals could reach 1 to 3 inches or more, with much lighter rainfall to the north.
Once again, the RAP model, shown below, indicates the heavier rain setting up a bit farther north compared to the HREF model, with the Euro model also supporting this slightly more northern solution for tonight’s heavy rain threat.
…Potential heat late this weekend-early next week…
Forecast models are indicating a huge upper-level ridge forming over the northern Plains and upper Midwest late this weekend into next week, with 500mb heights possibly hitting 600 decameters right under the core of the ridge.
To put it into perspective, a 500mb height reaching 600 decameters this far north would be extremely unusual and probably linked to a major heat event. Even a 500mb height of 597 decameters is rare this far north, though not impossible.
It will be interesting to watch how the models evolve in the coming days, especially in terms of how far north the ridge extends and how strong it becomes.
In Duluth, the last time the temperature hit 100 degrees or higher was on July 13, 1936, reaching 106 degrees. At that time, the weather service was based in downtown Duluth near Lake Superior.
Here are the record high temperatures in Duluth for July 12–14:
July 12: 102 degrees (1936)
July 13: 106 degrees (1936)
July 14: 98 degrees (1901)
The Euro model is currently predicting temperatures in Duluth to be in the low to mid-90s from July 12-14, but they could climb higher depending on conditions, especially the dew points. At the moment, the Euro shows dew points ranging from 65 to 73 degrees, which is very high. While those high dews would help keep temperatures slightly lower, if the dew points drop or mix out, the temperatures could rise even more.
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