Warming trend continues with few chances for rain in sight

Added: 2026-05-10

[00:00:00]Well, we have a warm day on the way today. Should top out near 70°. Little cooler for [music] the weekend, but overall, the warming trend is on track for next week. And it's going to get pretty dry around here.

[00:00:19]So, warm day on the way today. I think we're going to top out in the low 70s across southern Minnesota, 60s, 50s to the north. Uh we will have a few scattered clouds. We're seeing some of those drift through at 10,000 ft, but more sunshine than cloud cover, I think, today. And yesterday, you could really feel the difference. That early August strength sun, even though it was chilly, makes a huge difference uh if you're in the sun and out of the wind, of course. Next disturbance moving through off to the northwest. This is a clipper system.

[00:00:46]It'll bring some clouds overnight and a few showers, but unfortunately, not a lot of moisture with that. So, if you're looking for some rainfall for a freshly planted garden or your lawn, yeah, not a whole lot there. Uh early in the morning tomorrow, probably around sunrise, we'll see a few showers drift through the Twin Cities. And then, clouds will break up.

[00:01:03]We should see uh midday and afternoon sunshine for the most part. It will be a little cooler though, low to mid-60s tomorrow, few degrees below the average of 66, uh but not a bad Saturday afternoon, actually. It will be a little cooler in the northern part of the state. And then, Sunday, few degrees cooler yet. It's probably going to be a struggle to reach 60 uh with again some sunshine though. So, that will feel actually okay, a lot like yesterday on Sunday uh and dry for Mother's Day, too. And so, you know, we're still dealing with these cool air masses. This is perfectly normal for spring around here. I know we just get really impatient, but you know, we have leftover splinters of the polar vortex uh and kind of a blocking pattern that's kept this blob of cold air around. But overall, you can see the upper-level pattern shifts uh to seeing less and less of that blue over in our area and actually more of the heat building in from the west. And as that happens, the jet stream, which is kind of over us and occasionally south of us, meaning we're cooler, starts to lift north and in the longer term here, 7 to 10 days, the jet stream will be mostly flying across southern Canada, which is the summer pattern setting up. So, we will be warmer by next Friday.

[00:02:07]Then an average of the models has us in the 80s.

[00:02:10]You know, in these these patterns tend to break up more slowly than the models think, so might have to wait till next weekend, but either way, the warmth is going to break through occasionally.

[00:02:19]Next chance of rain comes Tuesday with some showers, maybe some thunderstorms.

[00:02:22]We're going to be lacking on dew points, probably in the 40s, but the European model does create a little lightning and thunder, but it's going to be pretty spotty. We got a spotty shower and thunderstorm chance Tuesday and Thursday. You add it all up through Wednesday of next week, we're not looking at a whole lot of rain. So, uh we still have some pockets of drought the drought monitor mostly unchanged from a week ago, but still moderate drought in Itasca and Cass counties and then some of the southwestern counties of the state. Uh and we are running starting to run up some short-term deficits now. When we look at just the 7-day period, of course, we've had very little measurable rainfall. Many of us are about an inch behind. You got to look big picture though when it comes to drought monitoring. And when we look at 6 months, still a surplus in moisture, of course, here in eastern Minnesota, but you can see why we still have some of those lingering areas of drought. There are some pretty substantial deficits in the 6-month period of 1 to 3 inches to the west and across north central parts of the state. So, this dry pattern keeps on, we're going to really be starting to see some of those deficits increase and maybe the expansion of drought. Uh 71 though today, pretty nice looking day. Uh a shower early early tomorrow, again, around sunrise and then 63, 60 for mom on Sunday and then gradually continuing that warm up next week. We do again have those shower and thunderstorm chances Tuesday and then Thursday night, but look at next Thursday, 75 and again, the potential that we're in the 80s by Friday, if not uh some point next weekend, which brings us to mid-May. And the second half of May, of course, is usually considerably warmer than the first half.