St. Cloud, MN Weather Forecast

Major Celebrations the Next 2-3 Weeks

For the next 15 days, central Minnesota will be caught up in major celebrations. This includes St. Cloud's Granite City Days (including the SCSU Lemonade Art Fair), the Sauk Rapids Rapids River Fest, the Morrison County Fair in Little Falls, and the Willmar Fests. And, that doesn't even count the Special Olympics. 

The following weekend, we have the 250th Independence Day nationally with numerous local celebrations. And St. Joseph will celebrate its Joetown Days. So, the weather for outdoor celebrations will be crucial over the next two extended weekends. What we want to avoid is a weather system, like the hail and wind storms from last Friday (top St. Cloud wind gust: 58 MPH) or the large thunderstorms that hit Iowa and Illinois yesterday morning with another round of storms from Kansas into Missouri yesterday afternoon and evening (set number of frames to 200 on the College of DuPage continental US radar loop).

Tuesday Best Chance for Weekday Rain

For Monday through Friday, the main storm threat will hit Minnesota tomorrow when the storm in Alberta (counterclockwise rotating clouds on the College of DuPage North America clean infrared satellite loop) pushes into Manitoba and Ontario. Some showers and thunderstorms will develop tonight in the Dakotas and push into Minnesota by tomorrow morning. Then, there will be another round of storms developing during the midday and afternoon. While it isn't likely to rain the entire day tomorrow, there will be a lot of clouds hanging around, so the severe weather threat is modest (category 1 of 5) and mostly involves the potential for large hail.

While thunderstorms will make the rainfall rather spotty, there is a better potential for significant rain in this system (see Day 2 on the NWS WPC quantitative precipitation forecast) than has been the case in the past few. That is crucial since the continued drought since last August is now producing well below average river and streamflow (orange, lowest 25%, and red, lowest 10%, levels on the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources stream gauging map when you check the weekly report box).

Only Puffy PM Clouds and Few (Mostly Wed) Showers

Otherwise, the forecast appears to be more dry than not. Each day will have some puffy midday and afternoon clouds and Wednesday has a 1 in 3 chance for a shower. Otherwise, Thursday and Friday could have a few isolated sprinkles, but that won't be enough to affect most events.

We will continue with the relatively modest temperatures central Minnesota has seen over the past 10 days, although the threat of a really chilly day (highs perhaps not getting to 70) would only be during tomorrow and only if we don't have a few sunny periods between the storms. Low temperatures will have a shot at getting into the 40's on a clear and calm night, with Thursday morning having the best shot.

Potential Return of Summer-Like Heat and Humidity This Weekend...

The forecast for next weekend is a bit more uncertain. A strong storm (one of the counterclockwise spinning systems to the south of Alaska on the Pacific mid-level water vapor loop from Colorado State satellite slider) is expected to push into the Intermountain Region by Saturday. That would change the steering winds over the Plains to a much more southwest-to-northeast flow, giving us the potential of more summerlike heat and humidity. This pattern could easily return highs to at least the 80's for the first time since the first half of June.

...With Uncertain Threat for Storms

The uncertain part is how far to the east that storm will move through the Canadian Prairies. The closer it gets to Minnesota, the better the chance for showers and thunderstorms. At this point, it appears that we could have storms overnight into the morning hours on one weekend day, but that's uncertain. The difference in track forecasts make which day uncertain. And, the storms might only affect northern Minnesota or stay mostly in the Dakotas or Canada.

So, you'll need forecast updates when we get closer to weekend concert, parade, and fireworks plans. I'll be watching this situation through the weekend.