textproduct: Duluth

KEY MESSAGES

- Light rain possible overnight into tomorrow morning across our southern counties. Largely expect most this activity to stay to our south with only a 20-30% chance of rain forecasted.

- Warm and humid conditions return Thursday into the weekend with on and off chances for showers and storms.

DISCUSSION

Issued at 1227 PM CDT Tue Sep 1 2026

Current Conditions:

Surface high pressure resides over the region this afternoon with a stalled out frontal boundary south of the Northland draped through southern MN and central WI. Despite the increasing clouds aloft the westerly winds across the region have helped temperatures climb into the upper 70s and mid 80s this afternoon. Winds are also slightly breezy with sensors reporting gusts in excess of 20 mph. After sunset we can expect winds to taper off and our overnight lows to cool into the 50s.

Wednesday:

Tonight and into Wednesday morning there will be a shortwave moving across the Upper Midwest. However, rain chances don't look overly impressive for our neck of the woods. The better chances will be further south closer to the stationary boundary. Some rain may be able to migrate into our southern counties. But looking at sounding profiles there is a significant dry layer below 700 mb that will drastically cut down on rain totals if not completely keep the surface dry. Any activity that does form will quickly move off and out of the region by late morning. Cloud coverage will decrease through the remainder of the day with highs in the 70s and 80s once again.

Late Week:

An upper level ridge builds over the Upper Midwest later this week. Despite the typical suppression that accompanies this feature, our weather pattern looks to turn slightly active. An upper level low over the southern Canadian Prairies will once again have an arching occluded front with an accompanying warm front through the Northland on Thursday. This will lead to continued warmth across the region with highs well above normal for this time of year reaching into the mid 80s. A resurgence of humidity will also stream back into the region with dewpoints climbing back into the 60s and 70s.

With the warm and moist air mass lingering across the region we will be keeping an eye on possible triggers for convection. The upper level ridge overhead will likely mitigate our typical air mass thunderstorms, but the aforementioned frontal boundary could provide enough forcing for storms to get going. There will also be several impulses aloft rounding the ridge that would aide in storm development. Placement and timing of said features still remains uncertain this far out but we will maintain some PoPs of 40-60% for the Thursday and Friday periods. Additionally, it is worth noting that the NCAR family of NWP convective hazards all depict a small chance of severe from the northwest corner of MN to SE near the Brainerd Lakes Region, which coincides pretty closely to where the deterministic guidance is painting the warm sector of the approaching weather system Thursday into Friday.

AVIATION /18Z TAFS THROUGH 18Z WEDNESDAY/

Issued at 1227 PM CDT Tue Sep 1 2026

VFR conditions currently in place across the Northland. An upper level low moving across Ontario is helping to increase the low level cloud field across northern MN and may lead to intermittent MVFR ceilings at INL this afternoon. Overnight, fog may develop once again before dissipating after sunrise. Additionally, there is a system moving across southern MN for early tomorrow morning that could lead to some light rain at HYR.

MARINE /FOR NEARSHORE WATERS OF WESTERN LAKE SUPERIOR/

Issued at 1227 PM CDT Tue Sep 1 2026

Gusty southwest winds today with Small Craft Advisories across western Lake Superior will continue through the afternoon. Winds will turn more westerly overnight with gusts still around 20 knots. Tomorrow, winds will be light and variable. Strong northeast winds will return on Thursday and will likely prompt another round of Small Craft Advisories. Additionally, the weather pattern turns slightly more active in the latter part of the week into the weekend with off and on showers and storm chances.

For the open water discussion, refer to the NWS Marquette Area Forecast Discussion at weather.gov/mqt.

FIRE WEATHER

Issued at 1227 PM CDT Tue Sep 1 2026

Stalled out frontal boundary to our south with surface high pressure over the region this afternoon. Slightly elevated fire weather concerns as Min RHs are expected to drop into the 30s with wind gusts out of the west in excess of 20 mph. Some of the more aggressive high resolution models have a few pockets of 25% in NW WI. Overnight, a shortwave will glide west to east. The better chances for rain will be to our south along the frontal boundary, but can't rule out some light rain across our southern counties.

Thereafter, fire weather concerns remain low. We start to build back some higher dewpoints through the week with off and on rain/storm chances starting Thursday and lingering through the weekend.

See the Fire Weather Forecast product for a more thorough breakdown of fire weather conditions.

DLH WATCHES/WARNINGS/ADVISORIES

MN...None. WI...None. MARINE...Small Craft Advisory until 7 PM CDT this evening for LSZ140. Small Craft Advisory until 7 PM CDT this evening for LSZ141>147-150.