Strong storms possible Wednesday night; better air quality Thursday
Warm and mostly dry through the weekend
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Strong storms are possible from near the Twin Cities into western Wisconsin Wednesday evening. Air quality improves Thursday. Temperatures warm up through the weekend.
Large areas of welcome rain with some embedded thunderstorms have been spreading northeastward across about the northern half of Minnesota on Wednesday.
Some of the heaviest rains have been falling in and south of Duluth across the Twin Ports region. Duluth’s airport measured 2 inches of rain for the 24 hours ending late Wednesday afternoon.
Severe potential
The atmosphere is unstable and the dew point has climbed to provide moisture for thunderstorms. Scattered storms are likely to develop quickly over east-central Minnesota by early Wednesday evening and spread into Wisconsin.
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A slight risk (level 2 of 5) for severe weather has been posted from the Twin Cities area into west-central Wisconsin for the evening.
Working against significant severe development are the cloud cover and thick smoke that cut off much of the incoming solar heating needed to kick off the storms.
Nevertheless, strong storms could develop rapidly early Wednesday evening when the daily heating has been optimized. Some could become severe. The main hazard would be the possibility of large hail. Gusty winds might also be part of a stormy package.
Dangerous air quality
Thick wildfire smoke that has been blowing into Minnesota from the southeast pushed air quality indices Wednesday into the red level, or “unhealthy for everyone” for southeastern to central Minnesota, including the Twin Cities area, and west-central Wisconsin.
Wisconsin has been hit especially hard. Note the purple band of “very unhealthy” air across that state to Green Bay.
An air quality alert remains in effect until the end of Wednesday for central and southern Minnesota.
The good news is that a trough followed by a cold front will flush out some of the smoke on Thursday. Friday looks even better. The smoke forecast beyond that time frame depends on what those vast Canadian wildfires pump out.
What about Thursday’s weather?
Thursday should be a warm day with falling dew points. A scattering of showers and maybe thunderstorms could pop up with the heating of the day. Look for high temperatures in the upper 70s across the north and 80s farther south. The Twin Cities should have a high near 87.
Warm through the weekend, mostly dry
Temperatures will remain warmer than normal through the weekend and into next week.
A slowly warming trend is likely to push high temperatures in the Twin Cities into the low 90s by Sunday and Monday.
Storms will be few and far between. A few can pop somewhere in the state each day due to daily heating and isolated atmospheric ripples aloft. The next best chance of rain might come our way on Tuesday, the Fourth of July.
