Area Forecast Discussion

KEY MESSAGES

- Much cooler, windier weather Thursday into the weekend.

UPDATE

Issued at 711 AM CDT Thu Jun 11 2026

Messaging was left the same from the dayshift. Clouds and showers will spread southeast over the area today...scattered to numerous in coverage with a few afternoon t-storms. Pea size hail possible with cooler air aloft.

DISCUSSION

Issued at 247 PM CDT Wed Jun 10 2026

..Synopsis

A lead shortwave will come off of the main upper trough currently over the northern Rockies/Plains, lifting through our CWA this afternoon and off into southern Canada tonight. The trough axis/frontal boundary will push through our MN counties and be through most of the CWA by this evening. The main upper trough starts to move off into the Upper Midwest and Ontario tomorrow and tomorrow night. Quite a few rain showers being produced by models under fairly cool air aloft, but CAPE values look to be less than 500 J/kg so severe threat is minimal. Northwesterly flow aloft sets up for the weekend and into the first part of next week, with a few weak reinforcing shortwaves moving through.

..Severe threat this afternoon

With the SPC meso page showing around 1500-2000 J/kg ML CAPE and effective shear in the 35 to 40 kt range, the severe threat will continue over our eastern counties for at least the next few hours. Some showers and thunderstorms have also developed behind the cold front near Jamestown but instability is much weaker. Cooler temperatures and drier dew points on the backside of the surface trough, so most of our deep convection will be out ahead of it. Severe thunderstorm watch in effect for our MN counties through 01Z, but will likely be able to cancel before then as most of our severe threat will be over after the cold front pushes through. SSCRAM probabilities around 25 to 30 percent for severe hail currently drop off quickly below 10 percent, although the HRRR still tries to develop some convection over the northern Red River Valley later this evening. Low level shear is not too impressive, and tornado activity isn't super likely. However, hail up to 1.5 inches and winds to 60 mph will continue as the cold front moves across northwestern MM.

..Cooler and breezy weekend into next week

Warm signal in the ECWMF EFI just for today and into Thursday morning, then flips over to cooler than climo temperatures. Nothing really impactful, but a break from head advisory conditions we saw yesterday. Low pressure over southern Canada will continue to bring a pretty tight pressure gradient through the end of the work week and into the weekend. Decent mixing up to 800 mb, but even the bullish BUFKIT soundings stay below wind advisory criteria. Breezy conditions look likely, but nothing warranting messaging at this point.

AVIATION /12Z TAFS THROUGH 12Z FRIDAY/

Issued at 711 AM CDT Thu Jun 11 2026

Brief MVFR cigs into Devils Lake and northeast ND this morning but majority of the period to see clouds spread southeast and cloud base heights in the 4000 to 6000 ft agl range. West winds 10 to 20 kts gusts 25 kts especially in DVL basin.

FGF WATCHES / WARNINGS / ADVISORIES

ND...None. MN...None.