WEST MICHIGAN- Since we’ve enjoyed several days in a row of warm and dry weather, it’s only natural to look ahead toward the weekend already. Many people have big plans for Memorial Day weekend, so they don’t want to be rained out.
Most likely you’re turning to your phone app to tell you the weather. I get it, that’s the way most people do things nowadays. If you use the standard one, you’re seeing something like this. All of the sudden, your excitement for the extended weekend is deflated. You can’t go camping. You can’t play golf. You can’t break out the boat. Well I’ve got some good news for you: the situation won’t play out exactly as your phone app may lead on.
Even looking at our 7 Day Forecast, it looks fairly ominous. Even with words like “scattered” and “isolated,” you still may feel like your plans are in jeopardy without watching the latest video forecast for clarification. (Found below.)
Now let's get to the reason the pattern changes a bit. The "big blue H" sitting over the Great Lakes region is a high pressure system. It's been responsible for cool mornings combined with warm, dry afternoons.
Severe weather has developed in the plains states already over the last couple of days, and as this frontal system draws nearer to us and slows down, we'll see opportunities for rain almost every single day.
The best opportunity so far for scattered thunderstorms and even an isolated severe storm looks to be Wednesday into Thursday at this point.
In our FOX 17 Weather App, it even looks very similar. The icon shows a cloud with lightning. To be honest, there aren't a ton of options for us to change that. But what I can tell you is that we always update the text to explain that a little bit better, and there's always the video forecast and forecast discussion in there as well. Most phone apps populate rain chances and icons by probabilities and computer models with very little human input. That's why ours is a little bit different, and you can download it here. I get absolutely no money if you download the app, so that's not the point here. I just want you to be a little more informed when it comes to extended forecasts.
As a recap, here are a few things to know for the next several days. A virtual certainty is that it's still going to be very warm over the next several days. Even with all those rain icons on the 7 Day and your app (whichever you choose,) don't expect it to rain everywhere, all day, for the next few days! There WILL be times you can get outside and enjoy the weather as we celebrate the first unofficial weekend of summer and celebrate all who currently serve or those who have served our nation. We'll keep you posted with any changes that may arrive in the forecast.
