Dramatic changes to our forecast this morning. After rains moved through the state this weekend, our forecast had been for additional moisture Wednesday through Friday of this week. These changes come completely at the hand of Hurricane Florence. Over the weekend Florence sharpened her course and looks to slow as she heads toward the Carolinas for a landfall later this week. A slowing storm over favorable waters for strengthening means Florence can really step up her size and scope. This storm is moving east-northeast against a typical weather flow pattern across the northern hemisphere of a west to east. Think of a snowplow pushing snow…the more if pushes, the more it backs up the snow in the path ahead of it and starts to push things around to either side. This hurricane will do the same to our weather pattern across the eastern US…it will back things up and slow progression down. For us here in Indiana, that will yield a much drier outlook.
So, as a result, we see dry weather the rest of this week, through the weekend and through at least Wednesday morning next week. There are no significant rain threats at this time. High pressure works in by midweek, and then as the pattern slows and stalls, we will find ourselves on the backside of the high, getting good south winds and dry air working in.
Our next front with good potential for precipitation shows up later next Wednesday afternoon (19th) into Thursday (20th) and may bring up to half an inch of rain to the region. Behind that, for the rest of the 11-16 day period, we have only one more system, around the 23rd into the 24th with scattered showers and perhaps a quarter of an inch of rain.
Temps will stay cool today and will get back closer to normal for tomorrow and Wednesday. However, for the rest of the week, weekend and the first part of next week, we expect warm air to build back in, and we should see afternoon highs running about 5-10 degrees above normal, averaging in the lower to middle 80s. With lower humidity and evaporation rates near maximum levels, we should see excellent dry down later this week through the end of the 10-day period, and we expect harvest should start to increase the farther out we go.
