Good Monday evening, everyone. We kept things pretty quiet as we kicked off the final work week of 2021 across the area. Our Monday turned out to be a bit of an interesting day when it comes to temperatures. After we saw midnight highs in the upper 60s, we had lows this morning drop back into the upper 40s and lower 50s across the region. With skies bouncing back and forth between partly sunny and mostly cloudy skies during the afternoon, we did see temperatures jump back into the upper 50s to near 60 during the day.
Looking at our weather setup, we have yet another warm front ready to lift in from the southwest as we get into the overnight and our Tuesday morning. That’s one system responsible for the cloudy skies and the increase in our rain chances.
At the jet stream level, we have a few upper-level lows out to our west. Despite that, some upper-level energy from those lows is riding along the jet toward us. That will be additional lift to aid in our increasing rain chances overnight and to start our Tuesday morning out.
While the overnight starts mainly on the quiet side, both systems will continue to pull moisture in and allow rain and even some t-storms to fire up on top of the region after midnight and 1 AM. With the cloud cover and rain chances coming into play, we’ll have temperatures hold steady during the overnight at our lows around 50.
The rain and t-storms will be around as we start the morning drive out for our Tuesday. With that being said, we won’t expect anything too strong or severe with these rain and t-storm chances. Even wit the rain chances in play, some of us could actually see temperatures start to rise a few degrees by the time we get to 7 AM on our Tuesday.
There is some good news about our rain chances. though. The rain chances will clear out before we head into our Tuesday afternoon. Even with that being the case, the rain chances for the morning could add up in many locations. While parts of southeast Kansas could pick up amounts between a tenth of an inch to half an inch, you can see how the heavier rainfall will favor areas along the I-44 corridor. This is where rain amounts will range between half an inch and up to 1.25″ until we dry out by lunchtime on Tuesday. While these numbers don’t suggest a flash flooding concern, we’ll still keep an eye on these rain chances.
As the rain clears out for Tuesday afternoon, we’ll also see partly to mostly sunny skies return to take us through the rest of the day. Couple that with a southerly and southwesterly breeze kicking back in, we’ll send highs back into the middle to upper 60s across the area.
While our Tuesday evening starts dry, we’ll have cloud cover build back in as we work through the night and into Wednesday morning. That’s because the backside of this system will have to pass on through the region. As it does, you can see how it will bring another chance for rain for Wednesday morning as lows drop back near 40 across much of the area.
Once the backside of that system clears out, the rain chances will clear out for the afternoon as some partly sunny skies return to the area. That will send us back into the upper 50s across the area. We’ll stay partly sunny, dry and chilly for Thursday with highs around 50. Let’s talk about the upcoming New Year’s Weekend. For New Year’s Eve, we’ll have highs pushing back into the lower 60s as mostly cloudy skies build back in ahead of another storm system coming in from the west. While it’s possible that we could see a few showers get going late Friday afternoon and into Friday evening, you can see how the Future Track wants to ramp up our rain chances as we go into New Year’s Day below.
With the way things look, Saturday starts out with early morning highs in the upper 50s before temperatures start dropping throughout the day. That means that while temperatures will be warm enough to kick things off as rain and t-storm chances, the dropping temperatures by Saturday evening may get cold enough for some wintry precipitation to start mixing in. As we head into late Saturday night and Sunday morning, we’ll be cold enough for any lingering moisture to end as some snow chances before we dry out for Sunday afternoon. A lot can still change since we’re still several days out from this system.
While we keep an eye on how that system will unfold, we certainly look to turn MUCH colder behind that system for Sunday. Lows will drop into the upper teens before we see highs only top out around 31 for Sunday afternoon. Fortunately, we’ll be dry and mostly sunny for Monday as highs look to bounce back into the middle 40s. Doug has you covered with his long range forecast out through January 22nd down below.
Have a good night and a great Tuesday!
Nick
Jan. 2nd-8th: Mainly a cold week with rain or snow chances on Tuesday and Wednesday.
Jan. 9th-15th: Mild start with rain or snow chances Monday and Tuesday. Turning much colder for the rest of the week.
Jan. 16th-22nd: Mainly chilly for this week. Slight rain chances on Monday and Friday.