A very warm week on its way; Scattered thunderstorms most days

Memorial weekend has been great for outings to lakes and parks or just hanging out in the neighborhood. That’s quite an improvement over last year. Memorial weekend 2022 brought thunderstorms to the Twin Cities on all three days. It culminated on Memorial Day in a major severe weather outbreak statewide with tornadoes, large hail and damaging winds.

A few widely scattered showers and thunderstorms have popped up during Monday afternoon. Radar has been picking them up over southwestern Minnesota moving northeast and over northwestern Minnesota tracking northward:

Composite weather radar at 5 p.m. on Monday
Composite weather radar at 5 p.m. on Monday
National Weather Service

A marginal (level 1 of 5) risk of severe weather remains in effect this evening and tonight from the Dakotas into parts of the western edge of Minnesota.

Severe weather risk through Monday night
Severe weather risk through Monday night
NOAA Storm Prediction Center

Air quality alerts into the evening

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Otherwise, air quality alerts for ground-level ozone will continue into Monday evening for parts of eastern Minnesota and western and southern Wisconsin.

Air quality alerts for ozone Monday
Air quality alerts for ozone Monday
Minnesota Pollution Control Agency and Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources

Red flag warning posted into the evening

And a red flag warning has been posted into Monday evening for much St. Louis, Cook and Lake counties of northeastern Minnesota where gusty south winds, warm temperatures and low humidities could allow fires to spread rapidly.

Red flag warning into Monday evening
Red flag warning into Monday evening
Duluth National Weather Service

Change to a much more active weather pattern

Looking ahead, those showers and thunderstorms that  out broke in the western half of Minnesota Monday afternoon are the leading edge of a change in our weather pattern. We’ll go from warm and dry to hot and more humid with scattered showers and storms most days this coming week as a series of disturbances advances slowly from the Dakotas across Minnesota and Wisconsin.

Showers and thunderstorms could wet the Twin Cities area Monday night. The best chance would be late in the night when a fresh batch revs up toward daybreak on Tuesday.

Hot weather with a bit more humidity, and thunderstorms, coming this week

Look for lots of high temperatures mainly in the 80s to low 90s, but cooler near Lake Superior, this coming week. The Twin Cities area is likely to warm into the upper 80s to some low 90s every day through next Sunday.

Forecast high temperatures for Friday
Forecast high temperatures for Friday
NOAA Weather Prediction Center

Lawns, gardens and farm fields have been drying out. Periods of rain would be welcome for most of us. It does look as though a series of loosely-organized weather systems will bring periods of scattered showers and thunderstorms throughout the week.

The strongest round of storms is likely to come our way later in the day on Tuesday. The Storm Prediction Center has posted a marginal risk of severe weather for a large chunk of Minnesota from Grand Rapids in the north down through Brainerd, St. Cloud, the Twin Cities, Redwood Falls, Mankato and Fairmont.

Severe weather risk for Tuesday and Tuesday night
Severe weather risk for Tuesday and Tuesday night
NOAA Storm Prediction Center

As the week goes on, the significant heating of the day will likely provide the energy to pop some storms mainly late each afternoon and evening. Severe storms don’t seem very likely from Wednesday on into next weekend.

How much rain will fall?

Showers and storms will be so scattered that some parts of the state will get missed on most days. Other parts might get soaked repeatedly. When it’s all added up however, the Weather Prediction Center’s forecast for the next five days ending at 7 p.m. on Saturday indicates that some areas, mainly across central Minnesota, could pick up well over an inch of rain.

Forecast 5-day rainfall through 7 p.m. on Saturday
Forecast 5-day rainfall through 7 p.m. on Saturday
NOAA Weather Prediction Center