Good Wednesday bloggers,
It is a warm October day as we make a run at 90°. It will cool down next week, but will we see rain? We talk about this below.
Hurricane Delta weakened overnight, mostly due to going over the northern Yucatan peninsula. It is now a category 2 and headed north towards Louisiana. It may strengthen back to a category 3 before landfall. It will make landfall in Louisiana on Friday as a 2 or 3.
It has yet to show and eye and this is a sign that it is not quite organized. Also, water temperatures near the Louisiana coast are in the upper 70s. This is too cool for intensification. So, hopefully it enters Louisiana as a category 2.
Now to our need for some rain.
Since August 13th we have seen 3.29" of rain. Average for this time period is 7.76". This makes us at 42% of average rainfall since August 13th, 55 days.
This is a map of the percent average rainfall for the last 30 days. We are at 47% with just about all locations in our viewing area under 50% average.
Here is the national percent of average rainfall for the last 30 days. It has been dry for much of the USA, except the southeast USA where tropical systems and moisture have been prevalent.
So, we could use some rain and there is a storm system to track for early next week. The data the last 24 hours has trended for this system to race by without bringing any meaningful rain.
This is the latest forecast from one model for rainfall the next 7 days. You can see it is dry over the driest areas of the USA, including here, where we need rain. The heaviest rain is in areas that have been wet and this is mostly due to "Delta". There is also some nice rain for the Pacific Northwest which is an area in need of moisture. Unfortunately, most of California gets missed. The heavier rain across Iowa and Minnesota is due to the system early next week. It is close, so we will watch this as the storm system solution is not set yet. If we miss this system, it will be another 5-7 days before the next chance.
Have a great week and stay healthy.
