Perfect Saturday, storms return north

Get ready for another glorious weekend in the Twin Cities. A more humid and stormy weather pattern returns next week.

High pressure generally controls the weather over Minnesota this weekend. The exception will be a few storms in the Red River Valley and northern Minnesota late Saturday into Sunday. The next potent low pressure wave slides east toward Minnesota from the Dakotas by Monday.

NOAA's NAM 4 km model captures the essence of a dry forecast over southern Minnesota, with chances for T-Storms in the Red River Valley and NW MN late Saturday and Sunday.

Temperatures Saturday push the comfy 80 degree mark in the metro with 70s in northern Minnesota. Does it get any better than this on a Saturday in July?

Northern soaking

Locally heavy rainfall fell across a good chunk of northern Minnesota Thursday night into Friday morning.

Northern Minnesota bow echo

Here are more details from the Duluth NWS on the northern Minnesota bow echo event from July 5th.

A severe thunderstorm complex packing damaging straight-line winds swept across northern Minnesota on July 5th, beginning in the afternoon and ending late in the evening. Damage from the severe thunderstorm winds were reported all along the path of the storm, but the hardest hit areas were Deer River in Itasca County and the Island Lake area just north of Duluth. A private weather station in Normana Township north of Duluth recorded a 71 mph wind gust.

Mid-July heat?

NOAA's models keep teasing us with the potential for a run of 90 degree heat in the longer range. The upper air pattern suggests we ride the northern end of a building heat dome in the next two weeks.

NOAA's 16-day GFS output cranks out a few more days at or above 90 degrees by mid-month.

The heat dome likely brings warmer than average temps to most of the USA in the 8-14 day range.

Looks like summer to me.