Thunderstorms set to rumble across the Plains, Midwest into early week

 By Brandon Buckingham, AccuWeather Meteorologist

Published Aug. 8, 2020 6:11 AM

Building heat and humidity across the Plains and Midwest will help to spark another round of severe weather to end the weekend.

The steamy air across the center and northern tier of the nation is in response to a northward retreat of the jet stream winds, which plays a major role in day-to-day weather. During the summer months, subtle disturbances embedded within the jet stream winds are often responsible for explosive thunderstorm development.

The thunderstorm threat over the coming days will be in direct response to those events.

After thunderstorms rolled across the Upper Midwest Friday night, bringing along heavy rain and locally strong wind gusts to places like Duluth, Minnesota, another round of severe weather fired up on Saturday and Saturday night, this time across South Dakota, Nebraska and western Minnesota.

Hail as large as 4.50 inches in diameter fell in Pennington, South Dakota, according to storm reports from the Storm Prediction Center.

The setup for severe weather during the day on Sunday will be somewhat dependent on how the remaining atmospheric energy from Saturday's activity behaves as it tracks eastward through the Midwest. On top of that, there will be another reinforcing disturbance tracking across the Canadian border that could act as another focal point for thunderstorm activity.

As a result, there is an expansive area that could potentially deal with severe weather on Sunday.

Impacts from the expected thunderstorm activity on Sunday will likely be similar in nature to what we expect to occur on Saturday. Damaging wind gusts, isolated reports of large hail and downpours, which could lead to localized reports of flash flooding, are all expected to play out within the threat zone.

Cities at risk for severe thunderstorms on Sunday include Eau Claire and La Crosse, Wisconsin; Minneapolis and Rochester, Minnesota, and even cities along the Interstate-29 corridor in the Dakotas.

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Conditions will begin to calm down across the Plains and Upper Midwest early this week as an advancing cold front is expected to sweep through the region. In its wake, an area of high pressure is expected to briefly settle in, resulting in quieter conditions.

Meanwhile, the zone of stormy weather will sink southeastward into the central Plains, Ohio Valley and eastern Great Lakes region Monday into Tuesday.

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