Limited Showers After Late-Week Storm

In the Midwest, warm air moving into the region caused a lot of snowmelt this week, helping to increase soil moisture. A very strong cold front is moving through the region on Thursday and is bringing through some good rainfall to a lot of areas. Snow will only occur across the far north. Another system moves through this weekend, but much of the precipitation will be up in Canada, though a few streaks of showers may develop. The same goes for another system early next week.

In the Northern Plains, a system moved through the region Wednesday into Thursday. It brought scattered showers, but were mostly light. Some snow moved across the north but is not accumulating much. Strong winds are creating blizzard conditions, however. Another system will bring some streaks of mostly light snow to the region on Friday and Saturday, though Wyoming could end up with some heavier snow amounts in some places. The region could see something similar for early and mid-next week as well.

In the Central and Southern Plains, a front moved through Wednesday night into Thursday and produced some limited precipitation across the north and east, but most areas stayed dry this week. Drought expanded in some areas because of it. Drier weather is expected through next week with the main storm track well off to the north. With high temperatures becoming extremely warm next week, that should lead to more soil moisture losses and increasing drought.

In the Delta, a few showers moved through on Wednesday, and more will move through on Thursday, but drier weather recently has led to more drought expansion across the region. Water levels on the Mississippi River continue to be low despite some help from snowmelt from the north. A few more showers may go through this weekend and next week, but the overall trend will be for drier conditions to end the year. That will likely mean drought expansion.

In the Southeast, it was dry most of the week. But scattered showers have developed on Thursday ahead of a front that will move through later in the day. Some moderate amounts will occur, but will not have a huge impact on the ongoing drought situation. Drier weather next week is likely to continue a trend toward increasing drought for the region.

In the Western U.S., the storm track across the north continued to bring a lot of precipitation to the Pacific Northwest this week. That largely continues through next week as well. Drier conditions farther south have yet to result in expanding drought. The storm track may favor southwestern areas next week as we get a couple of systems that could move through more of the deserts but especially through the central Rockies. Very warm air has been limiting the growth of snowpack in the region, though soil moisture is fair in most areas and improving across the north.

John Baranick can be reached at john.baranick@dtn.com