Monday, May 29, 2017

Warming trend this week.. dry weather expected into next week

It's been a cool and wet couple of days over southern  Manitoba, but things will be clearing up nicely this week as a stubborn area of low pressure over northern Ontario finally pushes east allowing high pressure to build in from the west. Cloudy skies Tuesday will give way to increasing sunshine by afternoon as the high pressure ridge moves in from Saskatchewan. This will lead to some glorious weather through mid week with plenty of sunshine and temperature in the mid 20s Wednesday and Thursday. The warmer weather will retreat a bit on Friday and Saturday with highs around 20C as we get easterly outflow winds from a cooler high pressure system moving across northern MB into NW Ontario. But things should warm up again by Sunday into next week as we get a return flow of warmer air back into southern MB.

As far as precipitation goes, it looks generally dry through the first week of June with long range guidance showing little in the way of major systems or convection over much of southern MB through the next 7-10 days. There is a risk of some showers and thunderstorms over SW MB Friday, but the risk appears restricted to SW MB into North Dakota. Things are actually getting a bit dry over southern MB, especially over far SW MB which has received only 10-20% of normal rainfall so far this month. Even the RRV has only seen about half the usual rainfall in May (normal May precip is about 55-60 mm) Farmers will be getting increasingly anxious if the dry weather continues for much longer as it will start to affect their newly planted crop.

39 comments:

  1. Latest guidance today now shows a band of showers and thunderstorms pushing across all of southern MB Friday night into Saturday, with areas of heavy rain possible (15-25 mm) This would include Winnipeg and the RRV. Earlier guidance was suggesting this band of precipitation would track into ND and largely miss the RRV, but models are now trending more bullish on precip chances over most of srn MB by Friday night. Showers should be gone later Saturday with a return to drier weather Sunday into next week.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Looks like our first 30C of the year coming up on Friday.. 925 mb temps rising to 26C with sunshine would translate to 31-32C for afternoon highs. Clouds will likely be increasing later in the day as band of showers and thunderstorms develops over western MB and pushes into the RRV in the evening. A marginal threat of severe storms possible, with strong downburst wind gusts as the main threat. Showers/storms will push off overnight and we'll be left with lingering clouds and some scattered showers Saturday.. but not a washout. Hopefully we clear out by Sunday.. but guidance is uncertain about how quickly we clear on the weekend. Canadian GDPS model is more pessimistic with clouds lingering through Sunday along with a chance of showers.. while Euro is more optimistic with sunshine. Hopefully Euro pans out..

    ReplyDelete
  3. Yep looks like we will easily hit 30C tomorrow! TWN is forecasting a high of 33C for winnipeg tomorrow.

    Rob did May finish below average for temperature?

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Yes it did.. May finished with an average temp of 11.3C, about 0.7C off the 30 year average for May of 12.0C.

      Delete
  4. Wow, what warmth at the airport today! 33.7 C as of 4 pm, and not even the hottest temperature in the province! Has this reading broken the daily record for June 2 in Winnipeg today? EC's timeline of records under its "Current Conditions" page only goes back to 1938. Regardless, this is a good blast of heat after a few weeks of iffy weather.

    ReplyDelete
  5. I saw 34.1C at 5PM. Yes we broke the record. Another source said this is the hottest June 2nd high going back to 1872 when records started.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. An official max of 34.5C at YWG airport today.. easily beating the previous record high for June 2nd of 32.2C set in 1934 and also 1948.

      Delete
    2. Couple that with the 17.6C at YWG to just edge the daily high minimum. Warmest June 2 on record.

      Delete
  6. Well that really wasn't much of a storm last night in Winnipeg. If that's what we classify as a severe storm here, yikes. Sure that gust front produced 91 kmh winds at YWG but that certainly was not the case through really the majority of the city. It seems like storm shield kicked into high gear right at the last second and storm pretty much fizzled out over top of us.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Yeah, pretty wimpy other than some good outflow winds ahead of the line of storms pushing in.. somewhat of a shelf cloud feature but not overly impressive. Saw some good cloud to ground lightning strikes south of me over Ft Whyte/whyte ridge area..

      Delete
  7. Today's forecast of sunshine and 28C for Winnipeg seems optimistic. More of a mix of sun and cloud day with afternoon highs near 25C.

    ReplyDelete
  8. Rob, I noticed that the risk for thunderstorms returns to Southern Manitoba Tuesday into Wednesday.
    What are your thoughts on this and will severe storms be possible?

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. At this point, it looks like the greatest risk of any strong tstorms Tuesday will be mainly east of Winnipeg towards the Ontario border by evening. Wednesday looks cooler with scattered showers possible.

      Delete
  9. Beauty day today with nothing but sunshine and temps in the upper 20s this afternoon.. (forecast high is 30 for Winnipeg but I think we may fall just a bit short.. 28-29C) Light winds this morning will pick up to southeast 20-30 kmh this afternoon, with relatively low humidity with dewpoints in the 12-15C range. A virtually perfect summer day.

    Things get a little stickier tomorrow with dewpoints in the 15-18C range by afternoon along with temperatures in the upper 20s. Current forecast high of 25C for Winnipeg tomorrow looks a bit underdone.. I'm thinking we should see 27-30C by early afternoon before clouds move in ahead of a weak trough that will produce a band of showers or scattered tstorms in the RRV by mid to late afternoon. Rain amounts don't look excessive, as the band will be narrow and move through fairly quick. A bit cooler Wednesday with clouds and sun along with some scattered showers.. but generally rainfree and highs near 24C.

    ReplyDelete
  10. Rob this may have been asked before but how come EC stopped adding monthly data for Winnipeg after 2007? Since they still provide daily data, you think it would be easy to just put that into a monthly format that way you can see each month summary on one table without having to go through each one individually on the daily data. There's no where to view the data monthly is there?

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. EC's climate data issues have been somewhat of a mess for awhile, especially since late 2007 when EC effectively took data quality control out of the regions, and centralized them in Toronto. EC has been lagging on regional climate data QC ever since.

      One of the reasons why there is no monthly data available since 2007 (at least here in the Prairies) is that the daily climate data has only undergone *preliminary* quality control (mainly through an automated algorithm) Daily data has to get cleared with *final* quality control before monthly data can be entered into the official archives. There are other issues as well (including moving to a new data format), but the bottom line is that QC for monthly and annual data is lacking, and falling behind every year. That this has gone on for 10 years now is ridiculous.

      From what I understand, EC is looking into getting monthly and annual data into the archives within the next year or so. I hope that's the case. Climate has become a big political issue in recent years, and it's essential that a federal weather service maintain a high quality and reliable database to monitor the state of our climate and how it may be changing in order to help make informed and intelligent policy decisions.

      Delete
    2. Rob I'm very disappointed in the EC records situation. On the news whenever they announce the records they use EC's 1938-2008 records. Which are very inaccurate because they don't take into factor the last 10 years or the 56 years of the St. John's College records. When the news says we beat a record high or low that may not actually be the case. And with the record books website gone there's literally nowhere to access these records anywhere. It just drives me crazy that the news uses these incorrect and outdated climate records because it's so inaccurate. For a federal environmental agency to have a data mess like this ongoing for 10 years is absolutely absurd and uncalled for.

      Delete
    3. Matthew.. the poor quality of EC's record database is a known issue, and is being addressed. EC has developed a more comprehensive "merged" record database that takes all the best data available for a station and merges it into one complete record database. It was supposed to come online last year, but there are some issues that still need resolving before it goes live. But at least it's being looked into. I agree that the current setup for reporting records is not ideal.. and in my opinion, we shouldn't be advertising records for a station if there isn't at least 30 years of data, or if data is not up to date.

      Delete
  11. Rob, it appears that this weekend could an interesting one in terms of severe storms here in Southern Manitoba. What are your thoughts on this?

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. There is still a lot of uncertainty about the situation this weekend over southern Manitoba. Models are still divergent and where the main surface low will cross southern Manitoba or North Dakota on Saturday. This will have significant impacts on where storms develop and how warm we get for additional severe storms. At this point it's looking like the main low-pressure area will move cross the international border bringing the likelihood of widespread showers and elevated thunderstorms over southern Manitoba for Saturday. Severest storms would likely be further south into North Dakota where they will be tapping warmer and more humid air. But this is all contingent on the track of the low, which is still uncertain at this time. Suffice to say, there is the potential for showers and storms this weekend, but we'll need a few more days to iron out details.

      Delete
  12. Dew points not coming up as much as I was expecting today… Precipitation chances look minimal for us this afternoon.

    ReplyDelete
  13. It's hot out there today Rob. Sitting at about 29C right now. Clouds are moving in too. Is there a chance of some storms?

    ReplyDelete
  14. Still some details to sort out but it sure is starting to look like quite an interesting severe weather setup for Friday and maybe even Saturday. Will see if tomorrow's model runs continue the consistency regarding this potential event later this week.

    ReplyDelete
  15. A high of only 22 forecast for Wednesday.. yet, humidex of 25 is also mentioned. Pet peeve of mine is advertising humidex (or wind chill) value when it isn't an issue. Forecast should just include humidex if it's >=30C, AND if it's >3C difference from air temperature. Otherwise, don't bother.. it gives the misleading impression that humidex is an issue on a day when it isn't.

    ReplyDelete
  16. Rob, I hear that some interesting weather could be on the way for Friday and Saturday? and then a cooldown next week? Are we looking at a return to below seasonal temps and could it be for a prolonged period?

    Thanks.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Looks like we could be seeing some showers and thunderstorms through southern Manitoba Friday night into early Saturday but then gradually try out over the weekend. We should warm up again early next week with another chance of showers and storms Tuesday before turning cooler after that next week.

      Delete
  17. Have to keep an eye on developing drought conditions locally. Well below precipitation in May, and only 13 mm so far in June (nearly half way into the month) at Rob's site. Somewhat disconcerting given that this is the wettest period of the year for our region. Hopefully we start catching up tomorrow with more convection associated with SW upper flow and disturbance moving up.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. MCS moving from Dakotas last night weakened/ split before reaching our region (10-15 mm rain over southern N. Dakota). LLJ firing up again tonite ahead of upper low as it moves NE. As per the Environment Canada and NWS forecast discussions redevelopment is expected overnite. Question is how far north instability/ forcing reach in order to give Winnipeg a decent rainfall.

      Delete
  18. How much rainfall did we end up seeing? I've been hearing talk of us entering a drought. After a wet fall and wet winter it seems thins have turned the opposite now.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Not really a drought, but we had been abnormally dry up to this latest system. Widespread rainfall amounts of 25-50 mm past day or two really helped the dryness so we should be in good shape for awhile. Generally cooler than normal temps and occasional shower activity over the next week or so should keep soil moisture levels pretty decent for most areas, although some parts of extreme SW MB could use additional rainfall.

      Delete
  19. Rob. Do we have a shot at breaking Sunday June 18th's record low max of 14.4C set in 1915. The weather network is forecasting a ridiculous high of just 14C! All other sources are forecasting higher though in the 17C-19C range. Weather network seems to be the outlier. I would love to break a record low max though!
    What are your thoughts on this?

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Matthew.. yes, Sunday looking quite cool. 14C looks a bit low, but we likely won't do much better than 15-16C. We'll be starting the day at 10-12C with plenty of cloud and brisk NW winds, so there won't be much of a recovery in temps during the day. Not the best Father's day weather, but for Manitoba marathon runners, 15C is preferable over 30C any day.

      Delete
  20. Rob, are we looking at below normal temps for the rest of the month here in Southern Manitoba?

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Unfortunately it's looking that way. Jet stream will be stuck to our south over at least the next week around large blocking high over Arizona (where temps of 50C+ are expected early next week!) That will keep us in a general northwest flow of cooler than normal conditions through the end of the month. There will be the odd day or two near normal, but those will be the exception. Sucks after such a nice warm first half of June!

      Delete
  21. These NW flow patterns are the worst and we seem to constantly get stuck in them. Cooler, dry weather with no storm potential at all since nothing is being driven up from the states where all the storms come from. We got robbed royally for storms this month. Hope next month isn't a repeat or else it's 2011 all over again and I shudder at that 

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Yeah, no signs of sustained heat over southern MB through the end of June into early July. So after a warm first half of June, the second half will be below normal. Similar thing happened in the second halfs of April and May.. hopefully that means a return to heat in the first half of July. I just wish we could get into an 8 week stretch of above normal temps in the summer instead of just 2.

      Delete
  22. It's very interesting how our climate is changing. Our winters are warming but our summers seem to be getting cooler ( am I correct in saying that, we seem to get these northwest patterns a lot )

    We did not break the record low max as our high is 16.7C as of 5PM. It was sitting at 14C for most of the day and actually dropped down to 13C at one point though. Was hoping we'd get one record out of this cold snap.

    One of the weather pages I follow on Facebook keeps saying that it's gonna be a hot summer, but I'm not seeing it right now. It looks like the cool weather is expected to persist for at least 2 more weeks though. Could this be the 2 week summer? After a cool May we had a warm first 12 days of June and now this. I don't really mind it as I like cool weather but I would like to see some heat too.

    It truly feels like early October today!

    Rob, overall did spring finish above average? Where did it place in terms of warmest springs.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Looks like our spring (Mar - May) in Winnipeg finished about +0.7C above normal.. (+3.7C vs +3C) So slightly above normal, but not even in the top 30 mildest springs here.

      Delete