Nearly 400 miles from where Hurricane Helene made landfall, the North Carolina mountain hamlet of Chimney Rock Village has been all but wiped off the map. The backs of restaurants and gift shops that boasted riverfront balconies dangle ominously in mid-air.
Breezy winds will accompany a dry cold front on Saturday. The combination of very dry conditions and gusty winds will raise fire weather concerns across the state.
The Minnesota DNR’s fall colors map suggests leaves are between 25-75 percent changed. The most colorful sights are in the state’s arrowhead region, central Minnesota and in the northeast. The Twin Cities metro area remains fairly green.
The northern lights will put on a spectacular show this weekend, following two powerful solar storms. One of these solar flares is the strongest we’ve seen in this solar cycle and the most powerful flare since 2017.
Sunny skies are back for Friday. Eighty-degree temperatures return Saturday along with strong south winds creating potentially critical fire weather conditions.
Get ready for the first frost of the year for much of central Minnesota. And freeze warnings are flying farther north. Temperatures will fall into the lower 30s in the far north early Friday morning.
President Joe Biden has toured some of the areas hardest-hit by the storm this week as he and Vice President Kamala Harris traveled to different parts of the Southeast. Former President Trump was in Georgia on Monday and criticized the federal response.
Cloudy skies make an appearance on Thursday with cooler temperatures in the 60s and 70s. We enjoy a few fall-like days before our warmth returns with the 80s. There’s a small precipitation chance on Saturday, mainly for western Wisconsin.
Drought conditions really expanded over the past week in Minnesota — 43 percent of the state is now classified in moderate drought, and there’s no significant rain in sight.
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