After weeks of disorganized severe weather and heavy rain across much of the eastern half of the U.S., a more organized system is expected to sweep across the Plains and Midwest starting Monday, putting the region at risk of seeing multiple days of severe thunderstorms this week.
A cold front will slowly push south over the coming days, and while the severe threats will be the same as previous rounds of wild weather, most people will notice a change in temperatures once the front sweeps through.
On Monday, severe thunderstorms will be possible from southeastern Idaho and northern Utah in the West through the northern Plains and into parts of the Upper Midwest.
However, NOAA’s Storm Prediction Center (SPC) highlighted an area from southeastern Montana and northeastern Wyoming through South Dakota and into western Minnesota for a level 2 out of 5 on the thunderstorm risk scale.
This threat includes Buffalo in Wyoming and Rapid City, Aberdeen and Sioux Falls in South Dakota.
Damaging wind gusts and large hail will be the primary threats from any severe thunderstorms that develop on Monday. However, there is a hatched area on the map where those threats could be more destructive.
A hatched area means a significant threat of the particular type of severe weather described in the associated map inside the highlighted area.
There is a risk of hail larger than 2 inches in diameter, as well as wind gusts higher than 75 mph from portions of northeastern Wyoming into central South Dakota. There’s also a tornado risk across those same regions.
As the cold front continues to sweep to the south, severe weather will be possible across a larger area of the Plains and Midwest on Tuesday.
The SPC has highlighted an area from southeastern Wyoming and eastern Colorado, including Denver, through the central Plains and into the Upper Midwest, including the cities of Duluth and Minneapolis in Minnesota and Omaha in Nebraska, for a level 2 out of 5 on the thunderstorm risk scale.
Damaging wind gusts, hail and possible tornadoes are all threats from the severe storms on Tuesday.
By midweek, the severe weather threat will extend farther south and put millions of Americans at risk of potentially dangerous thunderstorms from the central Plains to the Ohio Valley.
The SPC highlighted an area from eastern Colorado, northeastern New Mexico and the Texas Panhandle through Illinois and western Indiana for a level 2 out of 5 on the thunderstorm risk scale.
Major cities facing this higher risk include Wichita in Kansas, Kansas City, Springfield and St. Louis in Missouri and Chicago and Peoria in Illinois.
While the cold front dives to the south, cooler air will filter in behind it.
The FOX Forecast Center expects temperatures will drop to between 10 and 20 degrees below average for this time of year from the northern tier to the southern Plains.