Happy Thursday blog readers —
Warmer weather is building as we approach the weekend, but with that warm up, a system will bring rain and thunder into a pocket of our weekend.
A storm system days before the solar eclipse is making a lot of us worried about cloud cover, so let's talk through it all.
Weekend
Overall we've got a really nice weekend loading. Temperatures are getting back into the 70s and storm chances should stay tucked away to sleeping hours.
We've had Saturday night storms on our radar for a few days now, but today we saw a change in the dynamic start to show up.
The Storm Prediction Center (SPC) lowered the ranking for severe weather concerns to a one out of five.
Low pressure will eject form the Rockies Saturday morning with a larger parent low stretching north into Canada.
This system looks to lose it's severe potential quickly as it starts to occlude. The jet set up just isn't in the right spot to give this system a lot of juice.
Nonetheless we will have to watch for isolated thunderstorms Saturday between 10 p.m. to 4 a.m. in Kansas City, with our main threats being wind and low end hail.
The good news with this system is we will be able to watch it develop somewhere between Hays and Wichita Kansas around 5 to 6 p.m. and then Wes Peery will be able to track it coming into Kansas City pretty well.
So it's not like we are waiting for storms to develop on top of us. Which is why I do think Saturday will be a really nice day, just a little windy.
Total Solar Eclipse
The 2024 eclipse season kicked off March 25 with a lunar eclipse and will end with a total solar eclipse April 8.
This total solar eclipse comes on the heals of the 2023 west coast annular eclipse and the last Great American total solar eclipse back in 2017.
While we had great viewing of the 2017 eclipse, during the 2023 eclipse we were in the 60-70% coverage zone and the day ended up with full overcast skies.
While the fall eclipse favored the west coast, Monday's eclipse will favor the east coast, with some pretty big cities directly in the path of totality.
But our Saturday night storm system will be moving east by Monday, and if you bought tickets to travel, you are looking to have an unwelcome passenger with you — cloud cover.
So while heading southeast toward totality might sounds exciting, honestly Kansas City might be a sweet spot for viewing.
On the back side of a low we have dry upper tropospheric and lower stratospheric air descent.
This create a pocket of dry air fueled by a conveyor belt of sorts.
This area is usually void of cloud cover and that looks to be right where Kansas City is trying to hang out Monday around 1:54 pm.
But there will be cloud cover moving in behind this area of dry air; I just hope we can hold it off long enough to see 90.5% of the sun covered.
So while cloudy skies may ruin a lot of viewing across the country, I'm holding out hope for us here in Kansas City.
Because if we miss this one, it's going to be another 20 years before our next opportunity.
For the United States, our next eclipse season arrives in Aug. 23, 2044, mainly as a total eclipse for Canada.
Montana and portions of the Dakotas will be on the tail end of this eclipse as the sun is setting. But go ahead and pencil in a sick day for Aug, 12, 2045 ,right now.
It is set to be the next Great American total solar eclipse.
Safety Tips
When it comes to eclipse viewing, remember always use your eclipse glasses. It's also important to note that cameras, telescopes and binoculars require solar filters.
