Temperatures to reach above freezing by Monday

January has been unrelenting in its first week of the new year with unseasonably cool temperatures freezing over Mid-Missouri and most of the US. Many people across Mid-Missouri are less than fond of these Arctic conditions, and one really can’t blame them. Temperatures in the morning hours have been in the single digits while wind chills have neared the negative teens.

Although this may not be cold for a town in North Dakota, here in Mid-Missouri these kinds of conditions are things of nightmares! And if you are one of the people across Missouri that want this awful dream to end, then we have good news for you!

By the second week of January, the Climate Prediction Center has projected above average temperatures for Mid-Missouri, and this is evident in our forecast.

Temperatures are expected to sit in the mid to upper 50s by next Tuesday. You may or not be baffled by this fluctuation in temperatures; if you have lived in Missouri long enough one merely accepts the back and forth nature of the weather.

The reason for this increase in temperatures is due to upper atmosphere ridging that is going to allow warm and moist Gulf air to pull over Mid-Missouri. A high pressure system will develop throughout Saturday, and once this system moves to the east it will be in such a position that will pull in warmer air across Missouri. This will allow our temperatures to gradually increase over Sunday and Monday.

Another high pressure system will develop in the middle of the work week that closely mimics the one I just described. This second system will help bring in more moist and warm southerly air into Missouri, allowing our temperature to stay in the 40s and 50s into the end of the work week.