Updraft: November 9, 2010 Archive

Minnesota 2010: Top 10 warmest year on record?

Posted at 8:45 AM on November 9, 2010 by Paul Huttner (1 Comments)
Filed under: Climate, Severe weather

Welcome to another warm day in November.

This follows a warm of October (+5.3), a warm summer, a snowless March that was 8.9 degrees above average. Add it all up and what do you get? Possibly one of the 10 warmest years on record in Minnesota.

If you look at temperatures so far this year in the Twin Cities, it appears we're on pace for a top 10 warmest year. Not including November, temperatures are running about +3.3 degrees so far in 2010.

Of course, we still have November and December to go in the books. We're off and running in November, a full 6.3 degrees above average so far through the first 8 days, with at least 2 more significantly above average days on the way. That will put us about 7 degrees above average through the first 10 days of the month....but with much cooler air on the way in the next 1-2 weeks.

There is no way to tell what December will bring, but another above average month could put us in the top 10 warmest years on record for Minnesota looking all the way back to 1891. That's 118 years of data.

Here are the top 5 warmest years on record in the metro: The yearly average temperature for the Twin Cities is 45.2 degrees.

1) 1931 50.9 degrees
2) 1987 49.7 degrees
3) 2006 49.3 degrees
4) 1998 48.8 degrees
5) 2005 48.2 degrees

Stay tuned.

Chaotic weather pattern starts Wednesday:

Get ready for some big weather changes starting Wednesday in Minnesota.

A potent upper low and it's surface reflection will wind up and bump east into Minnesota by late Wednesday. The day will be breezy, and there may be a narrow band of thunderstorms late in the day sweeping from southwest to northeast.

There appears to be enough instability to kick off a few severe storms late Wednesday. With the relative amount of spin or "helicity" in the atmosphere high, there is even the rare November potential for an isolated tornado or two. Yes...I said tornado. And yes, I know, it's November.

The SPC has some interesting language in Wednesday's severe weather outlook discussion.

...UPPER MISSISSIPPI VALLEY...

WHILE WEAK...THIS IS EXPECTED TO BE SUFFICIENT TO SUPPORT SCATTERED THUNDERSTORMS...PERHAPS A NARROW BROKEN LINE...IN THE PRESENCE OF STRONG VERTICAL SHEAR...INCLUDING SIZABLE AND CLOCKWISE CURVED LOW-LEVEL HODOGRAPHS. THERE APPEARS TO BE SOME POTENTIAL FOR AN ISOLATED TORNADO OR TWO AND LOCALLY DAMAGING WIND GUSTS WITH ACTIVITY ACROSS MINNESOTA...NORTH CENTRAL/NORTHEAST IOWA AND PARTS
OF WESTERN WISCONSIN...BEFORE STORMS DIMINISH WEDNESDAY EVENING.

Pretty remarkable stuff when we should be talking about snow storms in November. But then again. this is the "anything goes" weather year that is 2010!

"Low confidence" forecast:

Forecast models are all over the place when it comes to the late week weather set up. A wave of low pressure sliding up from the south brings a change fo cold rain or snow Friday to areas from the metro south & east. It may evolve into significant snow for parts of Wisconsin Saturday.

A third wave of cold low pressure may bring snow showers to much of Minnesota by Sunday.

Bottom line: It's going to look and feel a lot more like winter around here by the weekend.

Stay tuned!

In the meantime enjoy temps pushing 70 today in southern Minnesota. The record for the Twin Cities today is 70 degrees. We'll probably fall short in the upper 60s, but it should be a good run!

PH

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