Goodland, Kansas

• For is forecast to linger through the morning. The fog may be dense at times.
• Chances for rain through Monday.
• Monday & Tuesday could bring some strong winds with gusts around 30-60 mph.

Current observations have upper ridging taking shape over the region. At the surface, we have low pressure to the west and high pressure to the east. This is allowing for more low level moisture to funnel in and has led to low clouds across the area and fog. The fog hasn`t been thick yet with the cloud cover, but there is an 80% chance that patches of dense fog will develop south of Highway 36 before sunrise.

During the day, the upper ridge is forecast to slide east while a trough slides east into the Rockies. As it does so, it is forecast to deepen the low pressure along the Front Range. This should increase the winds to be more around 15-30 mph with gusts to 40 mph. The higher winds are forecast to favor Eastern Colorado, closer to the surface low. This increase in winds should burn any fog off during the morning, but the cloud cover will likely stick around through the day with no dry air forecast to come in and clear the clouds. Temperatures then should slowly rise towards the 60s as we get to the afternoon hours.

Overnight, precipitation chances are forecast to increase as we keep the moist air mass in place while the surface low nears the area. With the additional forcing from the surface low/front and upper trough, showers are forecast to develop with maybe a few storms sneaking in. Instabilty will likely be too low for any strong storms to develop, though periods of heavier rain are possible. With winds remaining strong from the advancing low and precipitation in the area, dense fog chances will be much lower. Fog would likely form early in the evening and then fade during the overnight hours. This looks to be further compounded by the surface low bringing a dry slot to the area. Even with all of this happening though, temperatures will likely remain similar to the past few days with lows in the 40s and 50s.

Monday is forecast to start with a brief reprieve from the wind, unless the faster ensemble solutions verify and the front moves through at sunrise. Either way, the front should pass through most of the area during the morning and increase the winds. There is still a decent spread in the solutions, but the main core of the system is forecast to push north while the upper trough broadens out. With this broadening of the low pressure system, we would likely see winds from the northwest at 15-35 mph with gusts around 30-50 mph. The stronger winds should again favor Eastern Colorado with the earlier frontal passage. There remains about a 20-30% chance that the low remains more concentrated and pushes gusts more into the 40-65 mph range. The more shocking thing though is that if the dry slot doesn`t shift, we could actually see the sun for a bit on Monday with clear skies until the low moves enough for the wrap around moisture. This does give the area another chance for rain and storms, especially if the front stalls near or just south of the area. Should storms develop, there is a 5% chance that one would produce strong wind gusts around 60-70 mph with the downshear vectors around 55 knots and overall strong flow. The limiter is the better instability could be south of the area, and severe wind gusts from storms are less likely when the environmental flow and gusts are above 40 mph.

Monday night, the system is forecast to stall out just east of the area. This is forecast to lead to an interesting night with strong wind remaining over the area (20-35 mph with gusts to 50 mph) and some wrap around rain showers moving through. Fog would also be possible, though dense fog probably won`t form with the strong winds and downslope component to the winds. Cold air advection is forecast behind the front with temperatures lowering into the 30s as the night goes on. The more showers and cloud cover we have though, the warmer we will likely be.

Tuesday, the system is forecast to slowly push off to the east. The forecast is for a windy start with winds remaining around 20-35 mph with gusts up to 60 mph. A few lingering showers could also move through during the morning hours. As the day progresses, the winds should lighten and the showers end. Skies are also forecast to begin clearing. In spite of the clearing skies, the cold air that moved in is forecast to keep temperatures in the 40s and 50s during the day. The night time hours are then forecast to drop winds to around 5 to 10 mph with mostly clear skies across the area. This should allow temperatures to drop into the 20s and 30s.

Next week starting on Tuesday and through Friday, we are forecast to be in a revolving upper-level trough and ridge pattern over the area. On Tuesday, it is expected that the trough system from the short-term period will slide east, bringing in a cold front, and putting us into northwesterly flow aloft as a de-amplifying ridge follows in from the souther Rockies on Wednesday. Once the ridge completely de-amplifies and flattens out over us, it would likely put us into zonal flow on Thursday. After this, a possible additional ridge could form in to the south and amplify to the north on Friday. With this being said, there is some marginal spread of uncertainty within the overall evolution of the pattern. While zonal flow is favored, GEFS ensemble spread shows some variability of the small trough on Thursday that could lead into slightly northwesterly flow before the ridge arrives Friday. There is low confidence (30%) that upper-level northwesterly flow will occur earlier on Thursday.

Afternoon temperatures for this long-term period continue to be fairly consistent with highs forecast to be in the 50s. However on Wednesday and onward, near freezing morning temperatures are expected to occur in the Tri-State border area. With the spread of the overall pattern later in the week, there is low confidence (20%) that temperatures could drop a few degrees into below freezing over the entire County Warning Area (CWA) if the pattern becomes northwesterly. Otherwise, morning lows will likely be in the 30s and slightly above freezing.

On Tuesday, showers and strong winds are expected to end once the initial trough system passes by. Showers are likely to exit out of the area before the mid afternoon hours with winds from the northwest decreasing from 30 mph to 10 mph. For the rest of the period, we can expect the winds to be calm and shift a couple of times with the changing pattern. Clouds should remain relatively low before possibly building back up on Friday.

For KGLD & KMCK... IFR conditions are expected through most of the night and morning with ceilings around 200-500ft and visibility around 2-6SM. KGLD has about a 60% chance for 1/4 to 1/2SM visibility after 08Z. The fog will likely lift between 16-18Z, but ceilings remain low through much of the day. If the ceilings don`t lift, then IFR conditions will persist as the clouds lower again tonight. Similar to recent days, there may be a few showers, with the highest chance after 00Z.

KS

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CO

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NE

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