Another dry day today as we start to see south flow come back into the state. This will allow temps to warm slightly through the day.

Our next system continues to look less impressive for tomorrow and Thursday. At this point, we think there is a fairly decent chance we escape tomorrow with very little moisture – a few hundredths of an inch to perhaps a tenth or so. This will happen if the initial wave of moisture coming out of the northern plains today is less impressive, and more importantly, stays north of I-90 as it tracks east. Northern counties will be best situated to see scattered showers, but a large part of the state just sees clouds through tomorrow. Thursday we likely will not be so lucky, and a cold front will sweep through the state, bringing about 75-80% coverage of rain. However, rain totals still are not stunning. WE think we can see .25”-.75” rains, with most of the state closer to the lower end of the range. We allow for some .75” totals because of a concern about thunderstorms later Thursday afternoon in southern Indiana.

Dry for all of Friday over northern Indiana, but only for Friday morning in southern Indiana as our next batch of showers starts to lift into southwest parts of the state Friday afternoon. For the weekend we still are on track to see some significant moisture, with rains of half to 1.5” over 90% of the state. There is potential for some heavy thunderstorm action Saturday afternoon and Saturday night over the heart of the state, and severe weather cannot be ruled out. Rains likely linger in some light and scattered form through the day Sunday. The map above shows total rain through Sunday evening. This does include action from tomorrow and Thursday with it…but a large part of these totals come from our weekend event.

Better news for next week. WE see dry weather for Monday through Thursday. Evaporation rates should be good and promote good drying after the heavy weekend rains. It likely won’t be quite enough to spur field work, but we should at least be able to get back to square zero.

However – next week probably finishes wet. In the extended 11-16 day window we see a strong cold front sweeping in out of the plains, bringing .25”-1” rains with 80% coverage for the 28^th-30^th. Then, farther out in the extended period, a second front tries to exit the plains and upper Midwest for late the 3^rd into the 4^th, and it may have similar rain totals.

So, while field work was able to start in some areas yesterday (I saw it myself!!) anything that does not get in before the end of tomorrow likely will have to wait…perhaps a couple of weeks.

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