KOAM TV 7 Joplin and PittsburgSunday Evening July 24th

Sunday Evening July 24th

Good Afternoon Everyone,

**A few scattered severe storms possible today and Monday**

Today's Hot Topics:

Joplin breaks a new record by hitting my predicted high of 103° (was hoping I would be wrong and we would be cooler). We shattered the 1965 and 1983 record this day in history of 101°.

Yesterday:

Joplin sets a new record today after topping out at 105°. This topped the 1963 record set this day back in history which was 104. We are now starting to drift behind in our rain totals for the year and for the month. We are currently should be at 25.27 inches for the year and we are actually at 23.54 inches. We had a very dry couple of months as well. This month we should already be around 2.75 inches and we are currently at .82 inches.

We are in a heat wave. Here are some safety tips to help keep you safe in the heat:

http://www.bt.cdc.gov/disasters/extremeheat/

Current Forecast and Thinking:

A cold front has stalled out to our north and will continue to bring a few scattered storms to our area on Sunday and Monday.

Once again some folks were very lucky and managed to get a storm to cool down for a brief time. As Doug and I have been thinking, the cold front has stalled to our north only giving some scattered storms to our region. Here is a look at the 48 hour forecast which shows the high to our north (which gave us the cold front to our north) moving on to the east. Notice we have another warm front that will build in again from the southwest meaning another hot week ahead. In the upper levels we are seeing another large ridge of high pressure building over the western U.S. which will move over the area and keep us mostly hot and dry as well :( 

We will continue to see about a 20% to 30% chance of storms over the area until about Monday and then the chances will slowly taper off as another persistent ridge of high pressure moves into the area. September is just around the corner and in that time the suns rays concentrate further to our south allowing for cooler systems to come into our area and we really begin to move towards the Fall Season. This will no doubt be one of the extreme hot summers in history, but Fall will arrive and we will begin to see cooler weather again along with storms, storms, and more storms.

Here is the local radar:

Here

Here is a look at your latest 7-day forecast.

July (24th-30th):

Slight chances for a few thunderstorms here at the beginning of the week.  Then as another front will be near us late in the week, we will see very slight chances for thunderstorms.  I expect temperatures to stay hot all week long.

Severe threat:  very low

July 31st-August 6th: 

We should see a cold front that will stall near the area early in the week.  This will give us a little better chances for thunderstorms through the first half of the week.  Also if we get this front near the area that should drop the temps a bit.  The second half of the week should be hot and dry.

Severe threat:  Low(Sunday,Tuesday, Wednesday)

August (7th-13th):

A hot and dry start to the week.  Slight chances for rain as a cold front approaches the area early in the work week.  Then mainly dry the rest of the week.  Temperatures a little cooler during the work week.  Then heating up towards the weekend. 

 severe threat:  Low(Tuesday-Friday)

August (14th-20th):

This should be a hot and dry week.  I really don't know what else to say.

Ssevere threat:  none