⚠️ The Mid-Ohio Regional Planning Commission has issued an Air Quality Alert for today, primarily due to elevated levels of ozone. The air quality index is forecast to be 101, just crossing into the threshold of Unhealthy for Sensitive Groups.
The 614cast
Today’s tl;dr
☀️ Sunny and warm, high near 90. Fair weather, indeed!
Forecast highlights
🥵 Heat and humidity return to finish off July
Today really won’t be that bad… dew points gradually climb today, but we have a nice morning and just a warm and somewhat more humid afternoon. A noticeable change from the past couple of days, yes, but it could certainly be worse.
You probably know where I’m going with this…
Tomorrow, dew points go back near/above 70 — tropical levels — and stay there through the first half of next week. That’ll push heat indices into the 90s tomorrow and Friday. If you cross your fingers really hard, we might get just enough of a breeze in the afternoon those days to take a liiiiittle edge off the heat and make it feel a marginally less gross.
Just how high the feels-like gets this weekend will depend on timing of rain and whether clouds break to boost temperatures in the afternoon. For now, I’m buying the idea of them being lower than higher, somewhere in the upper 80s.
One place I look to get a sense of temperature trends is about a mile up. This forecast model shows a broad, warm pattern with a ridge of high pressure through about the end of the month. After that, it shifts west and the heat relaxes here.
☔ Still watching rain chances later this week
We’ll have some rounds of rain Friday through Sunday.
Current timing favors the midday and afternoon on Friday and Saturday and the morning through midday Sunday. That could certainly change, but this gives at least an initial sense of when we might have rain to deal with.
There’s not an obvious severe weather threat, but given the warmth and moisture, it wouldn’t be surprising to have at least an outside chance of a couple gusty storms. The possibility of locally heavy rain will also be something to keep in mind, although the ground won’t be as saturated as it’s been thanks to the current dry weather.
📊 Today’s almanac
Normal low/high: 66 / 85
Record low/high: 51 (1981) / 99 (1933)
Sunrise/set: 6:22 a.m. / 8:53 p.m.
🎡 Fair weather
I was planning on doing a stupidly involved dive into Ohio State Fair opening day weather history, but it turns out finding all the past dates for the fair is an awfully daunting task. So, here are the highs, lows, and rainfall since 2000 (thanks, Internet Wayback Machine).
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July 24, 2024: 88 / 68 / 0.00”
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July 26, 2023: 91 / 66 / Trace
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July 27, 2022: 84 / 70 / 0.25”
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2021/2020: No open fair
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July 24, 2019: 80 / 58 / 0.00”
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July 25, 2018: 87 / 68 / Trace
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July 26, 2017: 81 / 58 / 0.00”
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July 27, 2016: 91 / 72 / 0.00”
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July 29, 2015: 91 / 70 / 0.05”
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July 23, 2014: 84 / 64 / 0.02”
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July 24, 2013: 76 / 61 / 0.00”
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July 25, 2012: 91 / 64 / 0.00”
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July 27, 2011: 88 / 68 / 0.00”
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July 28, 2010: 91 / 70 / Trace
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July 29, 2009: 80 / 67 / 0.79”
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July 30, 2008: 88 / 72 / Trace
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August 1, 2007: 92 / 67 / 0.00”
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August 2, 2006: 94 / 75 / 0.00”
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August 3, 2005: 95 / 68 / 0.00”
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August 4, 2004: 81 / 66 / 0.32”
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August 1, 2003: 85 / 68 / 0.00”
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August 7, 2002: 78 / 55 / 0.00”
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August 3, 2001: 84 / 72 / 0.06”
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August 4, 2000: 77 / 60 / 0.00”
🌭 Bonus weather weenie content
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Extreme heat causing more potholes to form across Ohio (10TV)
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Corn sweat will intensify a heat wave this week (Washington Post)
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Weather balloons comic (xkcd)