Feeling more like late July again this weekend

We finished out the week in style here in Central and Eastern Kentucky with another nice day across the board, especially by late July standards. With high pressure still in control off to our northeast, temperatures and humidity levels stayed in the comfortable range for this time of the year so it felt pretty good if you were outdoors for any length of time. Even with a few scattered clouds around with the sunshine, afternoon highs jumped a few degrees back into the low-80s and that upward trend will continue in the coming days.

It should be a good start to the weekend overall across the area as a weak frontal system just to our southwest stays far enough away to keep the showers and storm chances at a minimum. While our southern counties may see a stray storm pop up late in the day, it should be a mainly dry Saturday so you should be in good shape for any outdoor activities you have on the calendar. Temperatures will continue to rise a bit with most spots topping out in the mid-80s for afternoon highs with a bit more humidity creeping into the commonwealth.

It’s definitely going to feel like summer again as we close out the weekend and kick off next week with a return of hot and humid conditions to the area. Afternoon highs look to climb back into the upper 80s on Sunday and with increasingly muggy air working back in, it should feel a touch hotter than that so you’ll definitely want to slow it down during the hottest part of the day. We’ll be on the eastern edge of an upper level ridge to our west into Monday so we’ll have to watch for the potential of a thunderstorm complex of two off to our north potentially clipping part of the region. While most locations may end up dry, we could see a few scattered storms  as afternoon highs work back to around the 90 degree mark along with higher heat indices.

A weak cold front should be working through the region Tuesday so look for a little better chance of scattered showers and storms during that window. We’ll have to watch for the potential of a few strong storms, but the set-up looks nothing like what we dealt with earlier this week. It should be another hot and humid day with highs around the 90 degree mark, even with the storm chances a bit higher. Once the front moves east, our weather should quiet down as we close out July late next week with afternoon highs backing down a few degrees into the mid to upper 80s.