WeatherFanatics: Early Week Severe Storms Target Minneapolis, Fargo

Sunday, July 20, 2014

Early Week Severe Storms Target Minneapolis, Fargo

By Kristina Pydynowski, Senior Meteorologist

July 20,2014; 9:35PM,EDT

Heat and humidity building across the North Central states will fuel potentially damaging thunderstorms through Tuesday.
Severe thunderstorms will first erupt later Sunday with another round to follow Monday through Tuesday.
Northern Minnesota and northwestern Ontario will become the targets of Sunday's violent thunderstorms through early Sunday night.
This includes International Falls and Hibbing, Minnesota, as well as Thunder Bay, Ontario.

A storm system emerging from the Rockies will then fuel severe thunderstorms in a west-to-east fashion from the Dakotas to the western Great Lakes Monday afternoon through Tuesday.
Severe thunderstorms will first erupt around Fargo and Bismarck, North Dakota, and Aberdeen, South Dakota Monday night and then will race to St. Cloud, Duluth and Minneapolis, Minnesota, at night.
RELATED:
North Central Interactive Radar
AccuWeather.com Severe Weather Center
AccuWeather.com MinuteCast™
The strongest thunderstorms through Monday night will be capable of producing widespread damaging winds, hail, flooding downpours and some tornadoes.
AccuWeather.com meteorologists are especially concerned for these violent thunderstorms in the corridor from the eastern border of the Dakotas to the Minneapolis area.
The severity of the thunderstorms will lessen some Tuesday morning, but flooding and blinding downpours and gusty winds will still be a concern across northern Wisconsin. Heavy rain will also pour down across Upper Michigan and into central Ontario.
A new line of severe thunderstorms will then erupt to the south and east later Tuesday from around Lake Michigan to Iowa. Cities in Tuesday's threat zone include Green Bay, Milwaukee and Madison, Wisconsin; and Cedar Rapids and Des Moines, Iowa.

Violent thunderstorms will then continue pressing to the south and east into Lower Michigan, northern Illinois and northern Missouri Tuesday night. Chicago lies in the threat zone.
A key ingredient to the impending severe weather danger across the northern Plains and Upper Midwest is the building heat and humidity that will bring some communities the hottest weather so far this summer.
The heat comes on the heels of the record chill that made caused the start of the recent week to feel more like September or early October than the middle of July.
After the high of 65 F last Monday set a record for the day's coolest high temperature, Minneapolis should see temperatures soar close to 95 F this coming Monday. The highest temperatures have risen yet this year is the 90-degree mark.
The passage of the severe weather will open the door for more comfortable air to return to the North Central U.S. for midweek. A repeat of the record chill is not in the offing.
As that occurs, AccuWeather.com meteorologists expect the severe weather danger to shift to the Ohio Valley and eastern Great Lakes on Wednesday and then the southern mid-Atlantic and Carolinas on Thursday.