The wind sure has been strong the last several days with gusts reaching 35 mph, and higher, from time to time. Wednesday was no exception with a west/northwest wind gusting as high as 36 mph for Rockford during the afternoon. Thankfully, now that the sun has set our wind speeds have come down quite a bit this evening and will continue to remain on the lighter end through the night. These lighter winds will carry over into Thursday making it a little more enjoyable to be outdoors, even if we see a few more clouds during the afternoon.
Strong wind gusts during the late Fall and Winter seasons are fairly common in the Midwest as winds within the jet stream tend to get stronger due to the changes in temperatures from north to south. The greater the change in temperature, the stronger the wind tends to be. We've also had some fairly strong low-pressure and high-pressure systems causing our winds to increase over the last couple of weeks. Wind flows from high pressure to low pressure and the greater the difference in those two pressure systems, the greater the wind speed will be. This is because wind is directly related to the difference in pressure between those two systems. The tighter the pressure gradient is between high and low pressure the stronger the wind will be.
Surface high pressure will inch a little closer to the Stateline tonight and Thursday which will cause our winds to relax some through the afternoon. But the breeze will pick back up late Friday into Saturday ahead of a cold front that is forecast to move through early Saturday. This southwest breeze will help bring temperatures in the low to mid 60s before we cool back down Sunday afternoon.
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