Rain follows 60-degree warmth Thursday night

 

For the third day in a row, afternoon temperatures reached the 60-degree mark, rising to a high of 61 in Rockford. It was windy, though, with peak wind gusts nearing 35 mph. Wind speeds have come down quite a bit since this afternoon as high pressure slides closer to the Stateline. This will help us maintain a mostly clear sky and temperatures quickly falling through the 40s during the evening, and then down to around 30 degrees overnight. It's possible that a few spots could get even colder, in the 20s, early Thursday morning.

There have been a few clouds streaming through the skies with a little more cloud cover noted over the Plains to the northwest. These are not expected to move in until Thursday morning, which is why I think overnight lows could get a little colder. This is something we'll monitor throughout the evening and make adjustments if needed.

Most of the daylight hours will be Thursday as cloud cover increases throughout the day. Initially, the clouds will be within the higher levels of the atmosphere allowing some sunshine to filter through. But through the evening cloud cover will thicken up as moisture gets pulled into the Great Lakes ahead of the first, of two, cold fronts that move through this weekend.

A dry low-level air mass will become more saturated which will eventually lead to a few showers developing after 8p/9p Thursday. While instability is not excessively high and most of the forcing remains to the north, there could be just enough to allow a few rumbles of thunder to develop, especially as we approach Midnight, with most of the rain wrapping up before sunrise Friday. Rainfall totals will range from near a tenth of an inch up to a quarter of an inch, with a few locations receiving a little more where any thunderstorms develop.

Winds will turn to the west following the cold front Friday which will bring afternoon temperatures into the low 60s. It'll be windy once again with gusts approaching 30 mph. The second cold front arrives Friday evening and begins the spill of a bitterly cold air mass into the region for the weekend.