The Fourth of July was the gateway to an unusual extended heat wave with a high of 90 degrees. It was a perfect day for celebration activities and as usual there were several grass fires due to fireworks. It is good the weather was temperate before the bustling holiday.
Now that the heat wave is upon us, low humidity during the day and temperatures at 100 degrees or higher for the next four days will dry vegetation out quickly. I would expect a red flag warning to go into effect soon. It will be warm in the overnight hours and humidity levels will not rise high enough to give much relief.
The upper air flow is what we call an omega block. A deep area of low pressure is well out in the Gulf of Alaska and a deep trough of low pressure is over the Great Lakes. That basically impedes the movement of the jet stream, and the weather pattern remains static. That will keep the so-called heat dome over us for several days.
High pressure will slowly move eastward and by the middle of next week highs will drop but it is possible we don’t see a high below 90 until next weekend. This will be a long dry and warm spell that will make memories to many. The good news of sorts, I don’t see us getting crazy hot with highs over 110 like three years ago but four or five days of 100-plus is noteworthy. Our longest string of 100-degree days in recent memory was four days. Five may tie or break a few records around the local area. More research to do down the road.
