Forecast, As Promised

Alright, here it is! Just finished it about 20 minutes ago. Enjoy!

FORECAST FOR DEKALB AND VICINITY, 11/15/09, 11:00 AM

Today...cloudy. High of 50 degrees. North-northeast winds at 10-15 MPH.

Tonight...cloudy with a chance of rain. Low of 37 degrees. East-northeast winds at 10-15 MPH.

Tomorrow...cloudy with a good chance of rain. High of 49 degrees. East-northeast winds at 10-15 MPH, with possible gusts up to 20 MPH.

Extended outlook...Tuesday through Saturday...

Tuesday...cloudy with another good chance of rain. Low in the upper 30s. High around 50.

Wednesday...a good chance of showers. Low around 40. High in the middle to upper 40s.

Thursday...chance of showers. Low in the upper 30s. High in the middle to upper 40s.

Friday...chance of showers. Low in the upper 30s. High in the upper 40s.

Saturday...partly cloudy. Low in the middle 30s. High in the lower 50s.

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CLIMATE DATA: Yesterday's high, 61 degrees; last night's low, 37 degrees. The average high/low temperature is 46/30. We had a trace of rain at the DeKalb campus over the last 24 hours as of 7 AM this morning.

We have had 0.01" inches of rain this month. On average, we should see 2.82" of liquid precipitation by November 30. We have had 42.35" of rain as of this point this year. On average we should have seen 35.22" of annual liquid precipitation by November 30.
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SEVERE/HAZARDOUS WEATHER OUTLOOK: No severe weather is expected through Saturday.
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PRECIPITATION:
Tonight: .01"-.10"
Tomorrow: .01"-.10"
Tuesday: .10"-.25" with local amounts up to .50"
Wednesday-Friday: .10"-.30"
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FORECAST DISCUSSION: This forecast could be summed up in just a few words: wet and cool. Right now it appears that the systems are slow movers, so they will take a little bit longer to leave our area. This is going to keep the weather gray and nasty for the next week, with showers sticking around throughout the week. The rain should not be heavy for the most part, but there could be small pockets of heavier rainfall in these systems.

This morning's surface map shows a low in Ontario, just north of Lake Superior. This has a cold front extending back through Indiana all the way into Texas. There is another low in southern Illinois associated with this front. We also have a low sitting back in southern Colorado. There is also a system sitting off the coast of Oregon, which looks unlikely to reach us.

Our forecast concern starts with the southern Illinois low, and then switches to the Colorado low.

For today, we should be okay with the low in southern Illinois, it will just keep things cloudy. Tonight the low should start to kick up some showers, and then our rain event begins. This system should just kick up a few showers, with nothing too bad.

As the southern Illinois low kicks up some precipitation, the Colorado low begins to move eastward. This system ends up with unfortunate timing for us. The southern Illinois low should move out of the area by Monday night, which is the same time the Colorado low moves in. This low is a bit stronger than the southern Illinois low, so we should see some heavier rain. We could see local amounts up to .50".

This system sticks around until Thursday afternoon, and we may get a few leftover showers Friday. Friday into Saturday, the rain clears up for a bit. It should be partly cloudy those two days, and we may even get back up into the 50s on Saturday. This may only be a slight relief, because it looks like another system will kick in early next week.

This next week is just looking nasty. On the positive side, our temperatures should be around average for this time of year. Unfortunately, it will just be rainy, so probably a good idea to keep an umbrella handy this week.

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Chuck Richie II
Northern Illinois University undergraduate meteorology student
e-mail: crichie2@gmail.com

Here are the map links I generally add:
250 mb (This one shows a nice deep trough across the US very nicely)
500 mb
Surface

Now back to a nice thing called homework! With some luck, I should be posting again soon!