DETROIT – We’re tracking two possible severe events over the next 24 hours. The first comes Tuesday night, but the more dangerous round rolls in Wednesday afternoon.
Severe weather threats
As the remnants of Cristobal move through the Great Lakes, we’ll see scattered showers and thunderstorms Tuesday evening and overnight. Most of these should not cause a problem, but there is a small shot that we may see a damaging wind gust or even a brief, isolated tornado.
Again, the chance is small. We’re under a category one severe risk Tuesday night (marginal), that’s the lowest on the scale. We should see some activity just prior to sunset in our South Zone, spreading north through the evening, and expect most of the wet weather to be gone by sunrise tomorrow.
Once the overnight showers and storms exit, we'll be dry with breaks in the clouds for the remainder of Wednesday morning. Expect winds to pick up, with gusts up to 40 mph. This is before any thunderstorms start to pop. As a cold front advances from the west with tropical humidity and highs in the mid 80s, we'll see strong individual thunderstorms form. These are much more likely to be severe. And our severe risk is category 3 (Enhanced) for Wednesday.
The biggest threat will be damaging wind gusts over 60 mph, but the tornado threat is higher than we typically see from a line of storms ahead of a strong cold front. Be prepared from mid-afternoon to just after sunset for any storm to turn severe. Make sure you have multiple ways to get warnings. The Local 4Casters app, ClickOnDetroit and Local 4 on air will keep you updated throughout the day.
By midnight, the severe threat will have passed, and we'll start feeling drier air advance into the area. This sets the stage for a very comfortable finish to the week.
Cooler days
Highs Thursday will stay just below normal with increasing sunshine. We’ll be even cooler for the weekend with highs remaining in the 60s on Saturday, before starting a slow climb into next week. Tuesday, we’ll be back above normal and see the heat continue to build into the official start of summer next Saturday.
Track the radar: