Friday, May 17: Here comes the weekend and a taste of summer comes with it

The transition has begun! We’re leaving cloudy, wet days behind, and it’s just in time for the weekend. A few pop-up showers and thunderstorms this afternoon will quickly fade after sunset with cool and quiet weather overnight.

Warm and quiet weather is in store this weekend. In fact, it could be our warmest weekend yet this year with highs in the 80s both Saturday and Sunday. The mornings will come with comfortably cool temperatures and areas of fog.

Thunderstorms are possible in central Kansas Sunday and these storms will try and make a run at western Missouri Sunday night. A cap, or lid, will likely be present in the atmosphere over Missouri and will likely inhibit these storms from sustaining themselves once they cross the state line. However, the strength of the cap could change (weaken) so we’re hanging onto a slight risk for storms Sunday night.

Monday and Tuesday will be well above average in the mid to upper 80s. The warmest temperature recorded for Monday, May 20 in Springfield was 90° in 1964 and for Tuesday, May 21 the record is 91°. The records should be safe, but we’ll be warm nonetheless.

With the warmer air comes an increase in instability. We’re eyeing next Tuesday as a Weather-Aware Day as a cold front presses in from the northwest. Along with the increased instability, there will also be a favorable amount of wind energy from the jet stream. This combination with the cold front could lead to severe thunderstorms on Tuesday afternoon/evening.

Remain weather-aware going into next week.

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