Weather
Seasonal pattern across much of the Heartland
Across the Corn Belt, showers in the vicinity of a cold front stretch from the upper Great Lakes region to Nebraska. Across the remainder of the Midwest, warm, dry weather continues to promote corn and soybean maturation, as well as early-season harvest efforts. Friday’s high temperatures will approach or reach 90°F as far north as central Illinois.
On the Plains, the season’s first freeze occurred Friday morning in parts of Montana, where temperatures fell to 30°F or below in locations such as Cut Bank, Havre, and Lewistown. Meanwhile, cool, showery weather has developed across portions of the central Plains. Elsewhere, hot weather is further reducing soil moisture for newly planted winter wheat across the southern Plains, where Friday’s high temperatures will exceed 95°F in some locations.
In the South, the remnant circulation of Nicholas—currently centered near Alexandria, Louisiana—continues to produce loosely organized showers in the Gulf Coast region. Unsettled weather also prevails in the southern Atlantic States, due to the complex interaction between tropical moisture and a cold front.
In the West, windy, dry weather in advance of a Pacific cold front is resulting in an elevated wildfire threat from the Great Basin to the northern Rockies. Meanwhile, drought-easing rain has begun to overspread the Pacific Northwest. Elsewhere, warm, mostly dry conditions in California and the Southwest favor summer crop maturation and harvesting.
