The Summer that Wasn’t: For the Midwest?

This may be a controversial take, but let’s dive in. Much of the country has been baking this year in 2024, with relentless heat advisories, and excessive heat warnings. The West coast has had a prominent heat wave, with a few breaks in between. The East coast also has had rather frequent heat waves, with some of the extreme heat all the way up to Northern Maine, and Southeastern Canada, with 90’s and 100’s surging well North, to places that seldom see these temperatures.

The midsection of the Country and the Deep South have also been baking. Really, the one anomaly here is parts of the Upper Midwest, and parts of the Northern Rockies, that have largely escaped the extreme heat and humidity.

Although, parts of the Midwest have also seen a lot of heat, particularly Michigan and points East, as they were impacted by the mid-June Heat Ridge, which was caused by a massive dome of High Pressure over the region, allowing temperatures to surge. Heat has begun building in areas of the Northern Rockies as well, but they had a slow start to the summer with some late-season snows. 

What’s the missing piece here? Well- much of the upper Midwest, particularly the states of Minnesota, and Wisconsin have seen persistent issues hitting the 90’s this year. In fact, Minneapolis/St.Paul has only hit 90 one time this year. Comparatively, last year at this time, they had already multiple days in the 90’s by mid-July- with a season ending total of 33 days above 90F! This is the latest that they have hit 90F since 1967- and by technicality, one could argue it’s the latest since 1993, since they did not hit 90F at all in 1993.

Departure from Averages:

Here are our departure from averages, with the first map being June 1 to July 17th, and the second map being May 19th to July 17th. The first map indicates that between Mid-May and Mid-June, things have warmed a bit in the Northern Rockies. 

 

What is the cause? We have had a very persistent Jet Stream pattern that has kept the storm track very close by. It has not been an explosive Severe Weather pattern for these areas, but just South, areas like Iowa have had a record year for Severe Weather and Tornadoes. Being just North enough of the Jet Stream and the storm track is proving to keep us wet.

Much of the Upper Midwest started the year in a drought, due to lack of snow last winter, but we quickly made up for that and alleviated the drought for many areas, due to an abundance of rain, which has even contributed to some flooding issues. Areas that are not in a drought, are areas that have had very persistent moisture, and as a result, temperatures have struggled to surge in these zones.

The exception being California- which has still been baking in heat recently, but due to relentless storms this past winter, they have alleviated their drought, and temperatures have continued to surge there.

US Drought Map

https://droughtmonitor.unl.edu/

There is still a chance that the pattern could shift and dry out for the Midwestern areas, as the Jet Stream shifts into Southern Canada, and pushes some of the heat into the mid-section, although, in the short term, things still look a bit cooler than average for the South Central Regions, and parts of the Midwest, with Heat finally building in to the North, which should allow things to dry out, for Southern Canada and the Northern Great Lakes Regions.

Outlooks from the Climate Prediction Center

Here are the 6-10 day and 8-14 day Temperature and Precipitation outlooks from the Climate Prediction Center. 

 

Comparatively, we have the 8-14 day outlooks, which look similar.

Next- the outlook for August- although it still looks warmer than average for many, you can see the distinct dip in confidence over the Upper Midwest, due to lesser odds of Above average temperatures.

Lastly- we have the 3 month outlooks for each category, temperatures and precipitation. Valid for August, September and October.

 

Some may consider this a welcome change after the excessive amount of heat and wildfire smoke we had last year in the Upper Midwest, which then took us into a very mild and relatively snow-free winter, courtesy of a powerful El Niño. 

Many have asked- how will winter be this year? Odds would favor a more typical winter, in alignment with what we have seen in recent years, due to El Niño fading, and the emergence of La Niña.

We will see what the rest of the season has in store, and perhaps we will catch up a bit for the Northland getting more 90 degree readings, particularly in Minnesota and Wisconsin, who have struggled to get there!

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Thanks for checking in!

Meteorologist Bo Cole