THURSDAY MIDDAY RADAR – The mid morning radar is surprisingly quiet. There are some showers and storms over northeastern Wisconsin and the upper peninsula Michigan and even some snow over Lake Superior. There are a few week scattered showers over far SE Indiana and southwest Ohio but for the most part the Plains, the Midwest and the Delta regions are dry and rain free this morning.
RAINFALL LAST 24 HRS ENDING 0700 CDT 18 MAY
Significant rain fell over much of Nebraska, Iowa, southeast third of South Dakota, central and southern Minnesota, all of Wisconsin and far northwest Illinois. Rainfall amounts range from 0.25-1.5″/ 6-38mm and the coverage was about 70% over all these areas. These rains were LESS than what was forecasted by the short range models yesterday and the medium range models since the weekend.
MAX TEMPS – 50s were common over eastern MT, eastern WY, all of ND, most of SD and northern MN… 60s over southern MN, NEB, ne COL … 70s over se COL, KS, northwest IA, central WI … and middle and upper 80s over southern WI, eastern IA, OK, TX, and all of LA, ARK, MO, MS, AL, GA, TN, KY, ILL, IND, OH, MI.
1-5 DAY = Model agreement here is very strong and leads to a high confidence forecast. The only real difference between the GFS model (LEFT) and the European model (RIGHT) is that the GFS model appears to have heavier rains over portions of Tennessee, Kentucky, southern Indiana and southwest Ohio. The GFS model also has a bit more rain into western and central Nebraska but other than these two relatively minor differences …the model agreement here is really quite strong.
6-10 DAY = But that is not the case in the 6-10DAY. The GFS and the European models are not in good agreement. Recall that yesterday afternoon the European model showed a large area of 2-5″ /50-125mm rains across northern Arkansas, Missouri, lllinois and Indiana. The THURSDAY morning European model has done another complete flip flop or reversal and now shows almost no rain in the same area where yesterday …12 hours earlier …it had rainfall amounts of 2-5″ /50-125mm. Obviously this sort of massive reversal… which is not common with the European model …does not lead to a high confidence forecast. The operational GFS model does show some rain over portions of Missouri, Illinois, Indiana, Tennessee and Kentucky but the rains are fairly typical in the 0.75 -1.5″ 20-38mm range.
In this case the model ensembles are hopeful. In the 6-10 day the GFS and the European model ensembles are in pretty good agreement over the Midwest showing decent moderate rainfall in the 6-10 day over the lower portions of the WCB and all of the ECB regions as well as the Delta. The GFS has more rain over Oklahoma and Texas than the European does while the European model has heavy rains over Mississippi, Alabama and Georgia. But for the most part it appears that the 6-10 DAY ensembles is the way to go.
11-15 DAY = There is not much to change in the 11 to 15 day. As you can see most areas of the Plains, the Midwest see at least some rain but a lot of it is not particularly significant. The best rains appear to be concentrated across central and eastern portions of Kansas, Oklahoma, all of Missouri, Arkansas, Tennessee and Kentucky.
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