Iowa Weather Report July 15th 2015: Summer Breeze Makes Me Feel Fine

RESPITE BEFORE MORE HEAT: A wonderful day in store today across the state with readings in the upper 70s northeast to the middle 80s in the western counties. Humidity will be tolerable for the most part and skies will be partly to mostly sunny to start. A system will move into the area later this afternoon into tonight and Thursday with a chance of showers and thunderstorms. Some of these storms could bring some heavy rainfall with them. Because of the shower and thunderstorm chances on Thursday, readings will be held down a bit due to the amount of cloudiness across the state. If we could get some sunshine to peek out for a time, we could see readings well into the 80s. Heading into the weekend, it will be hot and humid once more with readings well into the 80s and 90s with dew points back into the 70s. This will lead to heat indices at or over 100 once more. There is a slight chance of a shower or storms during the weekend, but the best chances look to hold off until late Sunday afternoon into the overnight through the morning hours on Monday. We should be able to have a clearer picture on this event in the next day or so.

NEXT WEEK: It looks to turn a bit cooler as we head into next week and drier at least through Wednesday. Readings in the upper 70s through the 80s are possible with partly to mostly sunny skies. Another system looks to move in late Wednesday with another shot of showers and thunderstorms possible at that time. Looking farther into next week the heat looks to return as the main jet stream heads north of the area.

THE JULY END: Looking toward the end of the month, the ridge looks to head back to the west and a trough looks to move into the Great Lakes and Northeast once again. This would put the state in a northwesterly flow once more with several chances of seeing some precipitation toward the end of the month. Since this is a departure of what we saw yesterday, confidence in this solution is low at this time.