Pushing 70 Thursday, hints of a Halloween chill?
Indian Summer is on it's way
Cool at night - and hot all day
Ain't no black clouds filled with rain
Santa Ana wind blew them all to Maine -Poco "Indian Summer"
Indian Summer 2014
The name Indian Summer conjurers up thoughts of sunny warm days and crisp starry nights. For just a few fleeting October days, Minnesotans may suspend belief that winter will ever come again. Deep blue skies. Vibrant hues of red and gold. Still green lawns and fields. The finest color show of the year.
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Time for one more lazy stroll around a bustling Lake Calhoun. One more boat ride. One more warm sunny round of golf.
Summer's encore in Minnesota is as sweet as it gets.
66 degrees high at MSP Airport Wednesday
59 degrees average high at MSP
+7 degrees vs. average
72 degrees in Appleton, Minnesota Wednesday
Thermal ridge
The warmest ribbon of air streams north over the Dakotas Wednesday. Missouri River towns basked in temps in the mid-80s. Balmy 70s nudged into southwest Minnesota. I saw 70 or better at Appleton, Ortonville and Montevideo. Temps hit 72 degrees at Madison.
The thermal ridge shifts east over Minnesota Thursday. Bank thermometers will flash 70 degrees in the Twin Cities metro area Thursday afternoon. The next cool front brings a breezy northwest wind and cooler air mass in Friday.
Indian summer-the sequel next week?
Friday's cool front brings us back to the 50s, and October reality this weekend. Another shot of mild air surges north next week. More 60s, and another shot at 70 degrees look likely.
Minnesota space selfie
These crisp clean October air masses make for some great satellite shots.
Check out this NASA MODIS Terra shot from Wednesday afternoon. You can see why Minnesota is what it is. Forests, drying crops, lakes and cities all clearly visible from space on this 1,000 meter resolution shot.
The essence of Minnesota in one picture?
NASA captures sun jack-o-lantern
This is too cool. Is the sun sending us a Halloween message?
Halloween chill factor?
This is still too early to be absolutely credible, but the first whispers of Halloween on the medium range Global Forecast System hint at a much cooler weather pattern.
Temps in the 30s and visions of snowflakes for Halloween are probably overdone, but you have to figure the other shoe will drop sooner or later as we approach No...No..November.
How wild can Halloween weather be in Minnesota? Here's everything you wanted to know about Halloween climatology from the Minnesota Climate Working Group.
Halloween is typically a time of crunchy leaves on the ground, and a bit of chill in the air. High temperatures in the Twin Cities are generally in the 40's and 50's. It is more common for the daily high on Halloween to be in the 60's than in the 30's. 70's tend to be a bit rare, with only eight Halloween high temperatures being 70 degrees or above. The warmest Halloween on record was 83 degrees in 1950, with the second coldest maximum temperature on record arriving one year later with a high of 30 in 1951. The coldest Halloween maximum temperature was a chilly 26 degrees back in 1873. The last fifteen years have had some balmy Halloween afternoons with a 71 degrees in 2000, and some quite cool ones as well with a 34 in 2002. There hasn't been a Halloween washout since 1997.
Stay tuned.