Isolated strong storms possible Saturday

The ABC 17 Stormtrack Weather Team is tracking the potential for a few strong storms by late Saturday afternoon across parts of Mid-Missouri.

The Storm Prediction Center has placed areas south of I-70 in a marginal risk (category 1) and areas along I-44 in a slight risk (category 2) for severe weather on Saturday afternoon into early evening.

Several factors will come into play as far as how certain the threat is on Saturday. The severe weather threat is largely conditional on how much cloud cover will stick around from morning rain. If we can get sunshine to break through the clouds, there will be enough instability for storms to develop and sustain themselves into early evening. If we can get thunderstorms to hold on, they'll have plenty of wind shear to work with in the low and mid-levels of the atmosphere. That ingredient is key in the difference between a non-severe and a severe storm.

If severe storms do develop, it would likely be between 4:00 and 8:00 PM with storms riding along the front and exiting east. The main concerns would be isolated damaging wind gusts between 50-60 mph and isolated spin up tornadoes with ample wind shear to work with.

The severe threat diminishes once the front passes into Saturday evening, followed by slightly cooler temperatures Sunday.

Stay with ABC 17 Stormtrack Weather as we continue to fine-tune the weekend forecast. Chief Meteorologist Jessica Quick will have the newest data and hour by hour forecast starting at 5:00 on ABC 17 News KMIZ. Stay up to date over the weekend by downloading the ABC 17 Stormtrack Weather App to get live radar along with alerts for your location.