Forecast contest winner

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Original upper air forecast for Monday June 22nd from Monday June 8th.

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Actual upper air map at 7pm on Monday June 22nd.

We have a winner!

Actually, we have two winners. One is an MPR listener that won the forecast contest. Another winner is the GFS forecast model and the prediction two weeks in advance of a Midwest heat wave. I guess that makes us all winners.

We'll get to the winner in a moment, but first take a look at the two images above. The top image is the 500mb (18,000 foot level) upper air map I posted on June 8th. The bottom image is the actual upper air map from yesterday.

What do you see?

Here's what I see. The GFS did a very good job of nailing the idea of a big ridge of high pressure in the central U.S. Monday. The actual ridge axis was a little east of the forecast, and the magnitude was not quite as high but the overall notion was good. That's why the heat wave verified.

The model also did pretty well with the notion of the western trough over the northern Rockies and west coast. The model missed the magnitude of the eastern trough and cutoff low over the east coast. The resulting weather was cooler and wetter than what would have been expected in the original forecast. Overall the GFS did a very good job of predicting the major heat trend two weeks in advance this time.

Okay now for the winner!

The official high temperature yesterday at Twin Cities International Airport was 94 degrees. Here's the climate data from the NWS below.

CLIMATE REPORT

NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE CHANHASSEN MN

153 AM CDT TUE JUN 23 2009

THE TWIN CITIES MN CLIMATE SUMMARY FOR JUNE 22 2009...

TEMPERATURE (F)

YESTERDAY

MAXIMUM 94

MINIMUM 72

AVERAGE 83

Many of you had excellent guesses! Here are some of the best guesses form the original blog post.

A: The ECMWF is indicating the same general pattern, but it only goes out to the 18th. GFS seems to have, surprisingly, good run-to-run consistency showing the ridge building into central CONUS. So, I will say high temp at MSP June 22nd will be 91. I'll go ahead and also say ORD will have a high of 97, and down here in SE IL, a muggy high of 95.

Posted by spencerp | June 8, 2009 4:40 PM

I vote 92 for hi temp on June 22

Posted by Chris Ruser | June 9, 2009 7:24 AM

I am going with 93 -- and I could not be happier. I love hot weather.

Posted by Susan | June 9, 2009 2:24 PM

My guess A. & June 22 will be 93 degrees. Thank you for this very interesting and fun weather prediction.

Posted by Bobbie Graham

Thanks, Jen. I appreciate your well wishes. Because of my track record, I'm going to "predict" in a way that may well get us what we want.

I'll predict (going with my camping theory) that it will be hot and muggy. Down right unbearably muggy with thurnderstorms which unlike Miami do not cool us down but like Arkansas simply mock you with the steam rising from the asphalt and roofs. It will be 95 and unbearable.

Posted by kathie | June 12, 2009 8:03 PM

Great guesses all!

Our winner nailed it to the degree, guessing the exact high temperature yesterday back on June 9th. Congratulations to Jacob. His post is below.

I'm guessing a high of 94 degrees and a dew point of 66. A hot and muggy day!

Posted by Jacob | June 9, 2009 8:31 PM

Not only did Jacob nail the high temperature, but the dew point yesterday hovered around 66 in the metro most of the day!

Congratulations Jacob! Here is what you've won.

An atomic clock with wireless outdoor temperature from La Crosse Technology. The unit is similar to these units on the La Crosse Technology site.

Jaocb, send me an email to phuttner@mpr.org with your adress and I'll ship the clock to you this week. Nice work and enjoy the clock Jacob.

Thanks for the great comments everybody!

Look for day 2 of our heat wave to peak today. We may see a high between 95 and 98 later today. There is a slight risk few a few severe thunderstorms late today and this evening.

PH