Happy Independence Day from everyone at the Iowa Weather Network! Hopefully everyone is enjoying the beautiful weather outside, headlined by a clear radar. While the weather is not perfect by any means, with cloud cover lingering around with below normal temperatures in the low-to-mid 70s, it is still a pretty nice day across the area. We have been pretty lucky as of late during the 4th of July weekend to have been able to have no real weather concerns, though this will quickly change as high pressure moves away from the area.

A heightened enhanced risk of severe weather currently exists over the northern sections of the state for tomorrow. A look at the upper air pattern for the next couple of days shows generally zonal flow keeping control over the area with a trough protruding southward from British Columbia and Alberta into the northern portions of the Intermountain West and Rockies. Within this flow will contain several shortwaves that will bring precipitation chances to the area, with the associated threat of strong-to-severe thunderstorms. Surface-wise, a low pressure system will hover into northern Iowa by Tuesday evening with a warm front across eastern Iowa.

High temperatures tomorrow are expected to be much warmer than today, ranging from the upper 80s in northeast Iowa to the mid 90s southwest. When combined with summer-time dew points in the upper 60s to the mid 70s, strong-to-extreme instability will develop over the region. Alongside steep lapse rates and modest deep layer shear, including some in the low levels, supercell structures will likely develop with the primary threats revolving around damaging winds and an isolated tornado. The timing and coverage of these storms is a bit uncertain due to how capping interacts with the environment, but the current expectation has storms firing in the late afternoon across eastern Nebraska, northwest Iowa, and western Minnesota, moving westward.

Storms may grow upscale as the evening goes on with damaging winds becoming an increasing concern. This is the main reason why an enhanced risk of severe weather was added over northern Iowa. The damaging wind threat is expected to continue into the night, aided by a strengthening low-level jet. Isolated tornadoes will continue to be possible within the line.

Nonetheless, if you have plans for Tuesday, it would be a good idea to keep a close eye on the weather. I believe that the afternoon should be okay by the most part, but events closer to the evening hours are more concerning.

The threat for severe storms continues into Wednesday as yet another elevated risk of severe weather is in place, this time over mainly northwestern Iowa. Confidence in this threat is a bit low at this time due to morning convection from the previous day. High temperatures Wednesday will once again be a bit warmer with mid 80s in the northeast to the low 90s southwest with a moist environment. Destablization will occur throughout the day with sufficient shear to lead to a possilbe severe weather threat. Storms will either fire or regenerate in the mid-to-late afternoon hours with large hail and tornadoes the primary threats. As with the case from tomorrow, the LLJ will increase through the night… which will keep storms going through the overnight hours.

Stay tuned to the Iowa Weather Network for the latest!