KANSAS CITY, Mo. — If the only complaint about yesterday was that the winds were going for most of the day, today Mother Nature will take care of that situation. I think yesterday was a top 25 day for 2023. I think today will be a top 10 day for 2023. Just perfect out there after a cool start this morning.

This perfect weather is one thing, but the area really needs some moisture and the hope is that by Friday we have some in the region. The first opportunity for tomorrow morning doesn’t look too promising right now. The next chance after that will be tomorrow night into Friday morning. Right now that looks more promising and we could really use it as yesterday’s blog detailed.

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Kansas City Forecast:

Today: Sunny and pleasant with highs in the lower to mid-70s and light winds for a change.

Tonight: Mostly clear with some clouds towards daybreak. Lows near 50.

Tomorrow: Partly cloudy with a small chance of some morning showers, especially on the Kansas side towards the west or southwest of the metro. Highs may again pop into the 70s if we don’t have too much rain affecting the area.

Friday: This is the day that hopefully we get some rain with chances starting later Thursday night into the first part of Friday. Highs may only be in the 60s depending on the rain situation. If we are a bit drier, we could be in the 70s again.

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Discussion:

The problem with the setup at hand is that the area most favored for the best rains may be more towards the south of the KC metro area, which isn’t terrible because they are actually considerably drier than us here in KC. But we need this system to “share the wealth” if you will and be generous for most of the area, including KC.

The overnight and morning data so far suggests that there really isn’t a great trigger for any overnight storms locally. There is a weak(!) little wave that may have a tough time in the morning getting much going locally because we do have a lot of dry air that needs to saturate over the next 36 hours. This is the same dry air that is giving us the beautiful weather right now.

The better chances of any rain tomorrow morning may be more towards central or eastern Kansas. For us in the metro, we may just not be in the right spot in the morning at least for much of anything. I emphasized last night on the news not to cancel plans for Thursday and this is why. The good news is that as the day goes along tomorrow, we should start to see at least some higher dew points creeping northwards, especially later in the day. That may set the stage for another disturbance to come our way later tomorrow into tomorrow night.

On top of all that, there will be a low-level band of stronger winds, up around 5,000 feet or so. We call this the low-level jet stream. That will be “poking” at us. Take a look at the morning NAM model showing this for tomorrow night.

This map shows the winds at around 5,000 feet. Notice how the oranges and reds are “poking” towards the state line area?

This means that the air above us will be getting lifted. That should help to develop areas of rain with some thunderstorms into eastern Kansas and spreading towards the east. The problem is that this doesn’t last too long for areas from KC northwards. It will last for longer for areas south of the metro. That’s why I think the models are suggesting the better rain totals will be south of the KC metro, which makes sense.

The morning run of the NAM model does show 1-2-plus inches of rain towards the Lake of the Ozarks region.

This is total rain through Friday morning 7 a.m.

This would be great news down south of the area if it comes to fruition because it is drier down there than it is up here, but still, share the wealth!

The hi-res NAM has this look for rain totals:

So on one hand, yes there should be rain in the metro. On the other hand, I don’t want to get hopes overly high for a lot of rain in the metro, at least into Friday morning.

Most of Friday overall shouldn’t be too bad, but we may have some cloud issues and that could keep temperatures in check for awhile.

Weekend weather in KC

The weekend overall isn’t terrible. You will notice the warmer weather though as highs may well surge into the 80s. With the warmth and the higher dew points, the “feel” of the air will certainly change compared to the last couple of days. Dew points may well be into the 60s over the weekend, especially Sunday, so muggy weather is on tap I think.

Rain chances are there with that, but the chances don’t look overly glaring. Saturday should be generally dry, maybe something isolated out there somewhere.

Sunday should be mostly dry, but there will be a series of somewhat weak little waves coming up from the southwest. Those could be a trigger for some scattered storms. They will be fighting a cap though, so it’s not a slam dunk.

If over the coming five days you end up disappointed by your rain totals, next week does look active. As I mentioned in yesterday’s blog, this is the time of the year where it doesn’t take a lot to get rain around these parts. We’ll keep an eye on the severe weather risks, but right now nothing too glaring is showing up locally.

The feature photo comes from Sandra Cox out in Leeton.