State Fair forecast: Storms fire up late Tuesday night

Tuesday, the first day of meteorological fall, will feel like peak summer at the fair. Late Tuesday night, we have some strong thunderstorms rolling into the southern end of Minnesota.

Cloudy but still hot

Tuesday at the fair will likely be hotter than Monday.

We’ll have an initial band of rain just to the south of Minnesota on Tuesday morning. While we won’t get the rain, we will get the cloud deck.

With the clouds, one might assume that it will be cooler, but the temperature could easily top 90 degrees out at the fairgrounds. It may be slightly less humid than Monday.

The mesoscale convective system forming over the state will bring rain to Minnesota’s southwestern corner by Tuesday night and move east through Wednesday morning.

That means you may wake up to a wet farm or garden on Wednesday morning, but we will not see a big impact from the rain at the State Fair.

West Nile virus risk remains low

We’ve talked before about sunburn risks at the fair. Now, let’s talk about mosquitoes. The Metropolitan Mosquito Control District says it’s been a pretty mild season so far.

“Not only have overall mosquito numbers been low this year, but August vector species numbers have been low as well. That's not always the case in drought years as the species responsible for West Nile virus transmission often uses catch basins and other urban areas that aren't as impacted by dry weather,” the agency noted last week.

Generally speaking, skeeter counts have been pretty low, although they are in line with expectations for this time of year. And the the types of mosquitoes that cause disease and illness are below normal.