Summer could bring warmer, drier than normal conditions

It could be a hotter summer with less rain than normal if current outlooks hold.

The National Weather Service is starting to issue outlooks into July. Those longer-term outlooks are “becoming more and more popular especially for the spring and summer because there’s a lot of people who depend on it such as farmers,” said Todd Heitkamp, meteorologist-in-charge of the Sioux Falls office.

“I think we’re looking at the continuation of drier than what we have been experiencing the last couple summers other than 2020. We’ve been pretty wet, and I think we’ll stay fairly dry after the month of May.”

The next 30 days

The 30-day outlook for May is calling for temperatures “to be a little cooler than normal, and precipitation to be a little above normal,” Heitkamp said.

The next 60 days

June is when it looks like temperatures will start to warm and precipitation will slow down.

“You can make a correlation that with lower precipitation you have less cloud cover, the soil dries out more and heats up quicker, so all those things come into play with changes and above-normal temperatures,” Heitkamp said.

The next 90 days

July is looking like more of the same, with above-normal temperatures and below-normal precipitation.

“The big unknown is severe weather,” Heitkamp added. “We really can’t draw any correlations. It might look like a slow storm season, but if you have one night like we had in September a couple years ago, everyone thinks it’s a bad severe-weather season.”

The short-term outlook

Honestly, confidence starts to wane past the upcoming week. That’s why these are called outlooks and not forecasts.

“The amount of science is pretty limited,” Heitkamp said. “It’s based on a lot of global influences.”

Overall, the outlooks end up being pretty accurate, he said.

“We feel confident they’re a good resource for people to use. Would I base my wedding plans on them? Absolutely not.”

As for the short-term forecast, “there are better chances of rain over the next two weeks,” Heitkamp said.

“This time of year, everyone is starting to plant and would like warmer temperatures during the overnight hours and additional precipitation to help seeds germinate. So hopefully, we get what we can get out of that, and then we’ll see what the rest of the summer holds.”