textproduct: Jackson

KEY MESSAGES

- Dry weather with mild afternoons and cool nights will persist into the weekend.

- A potential for rain will return by Sunday and last into the new week.

UPDATE

Issued at 820 PM EDT WED OCT 28 2026

00Z sfc analysis shows high pressure to the east of the state in control of the weather over eastern Kentucky. This is working to settle the winds and keep skies mostly clear. Currently, temperatures range from the low 50s in the most sheltered valleys to the mid 60s on the ridges. Meanwhile, amid light winds, dewpoints are generally in the mid to upper 40s with a few ridges spots in the upper 30s. Have updated the forecast mainly to add in the latest obs and trends for the T/Td/Sky grids. These minor adjustments have been sent to the NDFD and web servers along with a freshening of the SAFs and zones.

LONG TERM

(Friday through Wednesday) Issued at 410 PM EDT WED OCT 28 2026

The extended period opens Friday featuring unseasonably warm conditions initially, followed by increasing low-level moisture discrepancies as a weakening cold front sags toward the Ohio Valley. Aloft, broad southwesterly flow will dominate as 500 mb heights build to around 584 dam - placing values near the 90th to 95th climatological percentile across eastern Kentucky. This anomalous ridge will support strong warm-air advection, pushing daytime temperatures into the lower 70s on Friday.

At the surface, this decaying boundary is expected to sag across portions of the forecast area Friday before stalling and lifting back north as a warm front Friday night into Saturday. Model guidance diverges significantly regarding boundary-layer moisture ahead of this boundary. Deterministic ECMWF runs aggressively recover surface dew points from the low-to-mid 40s into the mid 50s on Friday. However, other guidance favors a prevailing easterly to northeasterly component around the surface ridge centered to our northeast. This trajectory will maintain a feed of drier continental air near the surface. Given these boundary-layer winds, dew points were blended down a few degrees below the baseline NBM to limit an overly aggressive, premature moistening trend.

To our southwest, the remnants of Tropical Storm Vance - currently in the Eastern Pacific - will weaken and lift northeast over the higher terrain of Mexico Friday into Saturday, getting ingested into the subtropical jet. Meanwhile, broader troughing over the western CONUS will feature an upper-level low digging from the Pacific Northwest into the Desert Southwest through the weekend. As this western system amplifies and cuts off, it will tap that tropical moisture plume and channel it northeastward Sunday into Monday ahead of a deepening Central Plains cyclone.

For eastern Kentucky, this will translate to high and mid-level clouds filtering in from the southwest late Friday afternoon and evening, gradually lowering and thickening through Saturday. Despite increasing clouds, unseasonable warmth will hold on across the region for Halloween, with afternoon highs reaching the low-to-mid 70s - roughly 5 to 10 degrees above late October normals. Evening conditions for prime trick-or-treat hours look favorable, featuring rain-free, cloudy skies as temperatures fall from the upper 60s around sunset into the upper 50s by midnight. Shower chances will then ramp up from the southwest after midnight as temperatures settle into the lower 50s, with rain continuing to expand across the area through the day, Sunday.

Considerable uncertainty remains for daytime highs, to close out the weekend highlighted by a 10 to 12+ degree ensemble spread across the area. The NBM has trended warmer, populating highs in the upper 60s to around 70, supported by the 12Z ECMWF in the lower 70s. Conversely, the 12Z GFS remains a cool outlier in the upper 50s, aligning closely with the NAEFS 10th percentile. This discrepancy hinges on boundary progression and rainfall onset. A quicker arrival of showers would lead to those unseasonably cool conditions, while a slower arrival would allow temperatures to warm into the 60s to near 70. Given the consensus between the NBM and ECMWF, leaned toward the warmer baseline, but this does entail a distinct bust potential.

Showers will persist through Sunday night before gradually tapering off into Monday, with surface high pressure east of the forecast area maintaining southeasterly winds and temperatures warming into the upper 60s to around 70 degrees.

The Rex block pattern will hold firm across the Ohio Valley through much of Tuesday, keeping eastern Kentucky unseasonably warm under strong mid-level ridging. While the baseline NBM continues to populate low-end slight chance PoPs (15 to 20 percent) on Tuesday, this appears to be an artifact of timing discrepancies among ensemble guidance, with a few faster members ejecting the cutoff low seemingly premature. Given the strong subsidence beneath the anomalous ridge (NAEFS 500mb heights near the 90th percentile), expect Tuesday to remain largely dry, with afternoon temperatures climbing into the lower 70s.

Rain chances ramp up significantly Tuesday night into Wednesday as the block breaks down and the cutoff low lifts into the Upper Midwest and Ohio Valley, driving a strong cold front toward our region.

AVIATION

(For the 00Z TAFS through 00Z Thursday evening) ISSUED AT 800 PM EDT WED OCT 28 2026

VFR conditions were present area-wide at the 00Z TAF issuance, and aside from late night and early morning river valley fog, will prevail through the period. The fog will bring localized IFR or worse conditions, but will not affect TAF sites. Winds will be light and variable through the period.

JKL WATCHES/WARNINGS/ADVISORIES

None.