AccuWeather's Long-Range Expert Joe Lundberg looks ahead to the early start of August when sizzling heat is expected to bake the Plains and Deep South regions of the United States.
00:00We want to talk a little bit about the big picture here as we look ahead to the big heat and maybe eventually a little bit of relief for some.
00:06So what are you tracking right now as we look into next week?
00:09Jeff, the big story right now is the building of the heat.
00:13It's going to be spreading into the east over the next couple of days.
00:16Then there'll be a front that'll come through that'll squash that heat.
00:19But in the nation's midsection, you're going to see the heat just continuing day after day after day.
00:25A lot of 90s and some triple-digit heat.
00:27This upper-level ridge of high pressure is really part and partial to the big part of the pattern.
00:31Over the top of it, you're going to see these disturbances that come down and they'll produce rounds of thunderstorms that can have some severe weather and some flooding downpours.
00:39Again, behind the front that comes through the northeast, it looks like you'll get some cooling relief in the northeast.
00:44That's the overall picture right now.
00:46I kind of focus in on the end of the weekend at the beginning of next week for the upper Midwest and over into portions of the Great Lakes.
00:52This area is going to see those disturbances coming over the top of the ridge in producing several rounds of thunderstorms.
00:59Some of it may be severe.
01:01And there is, of course, the risk of flash flooding, especially with the repeated rainfall.
01:04So that's where we are right now.
01:07All right.
01:07The shoe certainly fits with that big picture as we recognize weather patterns.
01:12It's a perfect area to look for strong thunderstorms, complexes that will ride along the northeastern, northeastern fringe of our big heat dome.
01:20As we track the evolution of the upper-level flow, will there be any relief?
01:24And how will it get worse before it gets better in some spots?
01:28Take a look at where the center of this area of high-pressure aloft is going to be.
01:31It's basically in the heartland, mid-Mississippi Valley, Missouri, Arkansas, Kansas, Oklahoma.
01:38That's where it's going to be over the next couple of days.
01:41Notice that with time, it kind of migrates a little bit farther to the west.
01:44You can kind of trace the jet stream out over top of it.
01:47That's why we see these disturbances coming on through.
01:50But then it goes farther to the west and southwest.
01:53But the pattern amplifies.
01:54The ridge gets even more stout up in here, which means a deeper upper-level trough.
01:58And that sets the pattern not for the middle of next week, but toward the end of next week.
02:03And really, the first five days of August, you're going to see that trough pushing down across the eastern half of the country.
02:09And with it, you're going to see notable relief from the Dakotas all the way to the northeast.
02:13There may be some record lows possible in the northeast, believe it or not.
