textproduct: North Platte

KEY MESSAGES

- Scattered thunderstorms are expected tonight, locally heavy rainfall and a few briefly severe storms will be possible. Drier weather is expected behind a cold front Tuesday.

- Cooler temperatures Wednesday will quickly give way to above normal highs by the end of the week with increasing precipitation chances for the weekend.

SHORT TERM /THROUGH TUESDAY NIGHT/

Issued at 402 PM CDT Mon Sep 7 2026

Upper level ridging will remain anchored across the southern plains through Tuesday night. Meanwhile a potent upper level low will be crossing southern Canada with upper troughing extending southward northern Plains. A slow moving cold front associated with the northern plains troughing is slowly moving southeastward across western Nebraska this afternoon. The front by early this evening should be located from near Ainsworth to North Platte. Moisture is pooling ahead of the front with the latest 18Z sounding at North Platte near 1.5". As far as the expected scenario: isolated to widely scattered thunderstorms could develop along the front during the late afternoon hours. The more probable solution would be for storms to form near and just to the north of the front this evening on the nose of s strong southerly low-level jet. This could sustain several hours of at least scattered thunderstorm activity before the low-level jet begins to veer to the southwest and the front progresses southeast of the area late tonight. Expected hazards: locally heavy rainfall will be of concern due to the high moisture content in the atmosphere. As far as the severe potential, overall shear and instability would support some storm organization and there is at least some potential for a few briefly severe storms with hail and strong gusty winds.

The front will sink south of the area tomorrow (Tuesday)...with the convective potential shifting south and east of the area. Humidity does get quite low behind the front Tuesday afternoon across northwest Nebraska, but winds are decreasing during this time which should keep any fire weather concerns in check.

LONG TERM /WEDNESDAY THROUGH MONDAY/

Issued at 402 PM CDT Mon Sep 7 2026

Upper flow will become generally zonal by midweek across most of CONUS. The departing frontal boundary from Monday/Tuesday will not only bring a slight cooldown, with highs forecasted to be in the low to mid 80s across the region but will also prevent the northward expansion of richer low-level moisture for the next few days. This will coincide with high pressure settling into the region, precluding any high chances for measureable precipitation during this time frame. A break from the zonal flow in way of an upper level ridge is forecasted to trek across the northern Plains Thursday/Friday. This ridge is expected to further build upon the high pressure that is settled into the region and bringing daytime highs up to mid to upper 80s Thursday and the upper 80s to low 90s Friday. Additionally, dry air is expected to creep in from the west with humidity dropping to the low to mid teens along and west of HWY 61. This area of low humidity will have some overlap with breezy winds of 15 to 20 mph gusting up to near 30 mph out of the southwest Thursday, then out of the northwest Friday to highlight at least the potential for elevated fire weather conditions, especially with a lot of areas still being in D2 drought.

Moving into the weekend, deep troughing will move onshore into the Pacific Northwest sometime early Saturday. This feature will continue to dig southward and move across the Rockies into the northern/central Plains through the weekend. In the lead up to this, weak southwesterly flow will establish itself across Nebraska. This will allow for better moisture transport to again reach our neck of the woods. HREF guidance has forecasted PWATs of a range of 1.0 to 1.25 inches which would put us near the 95th percentile with other models pushing that percentile to near 140% above normal. This would suggest the potential for a greater rain potential to go along with a cooldown. While high PWATs are forecasted, guidance has still been a bit bullish on total accumulations during this period, maintaining only a 30 to 50 percent chance of the region seeing at least 0.10" of rainfall each day Saturday through early Monday morning. The higher end percent of this is located on the east side of our CWA from HWY 83 and east.

AVIATION /00Z TAFS THROUGH 00Z WEDNESDAY/

Issued at 556 PM CDT Mon Sep 7 2026

There will be a threat for thunderstorms at the KLBF terminal from 00z to 06z this evening. Will handle this with a VCTS group through 02z with a tempo group from 02z to 06z this evening. Skies will remain mostly cloudy overnight into Tuesday morning with ceilings ranging from 10000 to 20000 FT AGL. Expect clearing skies there after. For the KLBF terminal: Expect mainly broken ceilings around 20000 FT AGL to persist through early Tuesday morning. Ceilings will then increase to 25000 FT AGL remaining broken through Tuesday afternoon.

LBF WATCHES/WARNINGS/ADVISORIES

None.