U.S. Weather/Crop Progress
U.S. Drought Monitor Weather Forecast: For the period August 7 through August 11, monsoon precipitation will again be relatively scarce across the Desert Southwest and the rest of the West will be seasonally dry as well. Prospects for the southern Plains and lower Mississippi Basin don’t look good either. Better odds for the wet stuff can be seen in the upper Midwest, the Mid-Atlantic (heavy rains are forecasted for Virginia, Delaware and extreme western Carolinas along with northeastern North Carolina), the Southeast (central Alabama and the western half of Georgia) and along the coastal reaches of the Gulf Coast region (from southern Alabama across the Florida Panhandle and into northern Florida) if all goes as forecasted. Temperatures for this same period show cooler weather across the Great Basin with near-normal readings likely in the Pacific Northwest and rest of the West Coast. Cooler weather is also expected across the northern Plains, New England and Mid-Atlantic. The only real projected hot spot over the next 5 days can be found in the central Plains, the southern and central Rockies and front ranges, southern Plains and lower Mississippi Basin where temperatures are expected to run 3-9 degrees above normal.
The 10-day (valid for August 11-14, 2015) and14-day (valid for August 13-19, 2015) outlooks appear pretty similar and the models are in good agreement about the building of a ridge across the west-central U.S. during this timeframe. This will likely bring a late summer heat wave across the Great Plains, upper Midwest, lower Mississippi Basin, the Rockies and the Desert Southwest. Cooler weather is expected in the Pacific Northwest, western Great Basin and the Northeast. One significant feature worth noting is that the 14-day outlook projects a stronger likelihood of above-normal temperatures across the West and into the Southeast and Carolinas, which the10-day outlook does not.
As for precipitation during these time frames, below-normal totals are more likely, and coincide with, the projected hot spot areas depicted across the entire mid-section of the country from the Gulf of Mexico to Canada (Texas to Michigan and most points in between across the Great Plains and Midwest). Better chances of precipitation can be found in the Pacific Northwest, east-central Great Basin, the Atlantic Seaboard region from Maine to north Florida and the coastal areas in the Gulf Coast region from Mississippi eastward to Florida. The southern tip of Florida looks to remain dry at least through the middle of the August as well. Follow this link to view current U.S. and international weather patterns and the future outlook: Weather and Crop Bulletin.