textproduct: Louisville

KEY MESSAGES

* Scattered showers and thunderstorms continue bringing threats of isolated flash flooding, lightning, and gusty winds late this afternoon and evening.

* Rounds of showers and thunderstorms are expected late week through the weekend along a slow moving frontal boundary. Flash Flooding, including potential for significant flash flooding, could develop late week through the weekend with repeated rounds of heavy rain.

* Additional threats of gusty to damaging wind could develop with complexes of thunderstorms moving into the area. Overall confidence is low with regard to timing of these specific threats.

* A drier overall pattern looks to take hold for early to middle next week. Look for highs in the upper 80s to near 90.

SHORT TERM /THROUGH SATURDAY NIGHT/

Issued at 254 PM EDT Wed Jul 8 2026

Now - Tonight...

The closed upper low that has plagued the region for the past several days will finally get picked up by the prevailing westerlies this evening, and exit the region later tonight as an open shortwave. Ahead of this feature, PWATs have pooled into the 2-2.1" range throughout the column. The lack of deep layer shear is promoting slow storm movement, and with tall/skinny CAPE profiles combined with deep freezing levels above 14K feet, efficient heavy rainers will occur. Localized Flash Flooding will continue to be a threat through this afternoon and evening with HREF LMPP data suggesting isolated pockets of 2-4" amounts are possible in 1 to 2 hours. This is similar to what we have seen the past few days for some areas. Expect a handful of Flood Advisories and a few Flash Flood Warnings through this evening. Some slow moving showers and storms could linger deeper into tonight, mainly across our eastern CWA ahead of the upper trough axis, but overall confidence is low in how deep they will survive past peak heating.

Thursday - Sunday...

The late week into the weekend upper pattern will feature progressive zonal flow, with a series of shortwaves and/or convection induced MCV's traversing our area. Meanwhile, a surface frontal boundary will slowly sink southward across the region during this time. The end result will be waves of showers and thunderstorms riding along a nearly-stationary frontal boundary, and roughly parallel to the upper flow.

Expect there to be some sort of mostly dry period on Thursday as lingering showers exit our east with the departing shortwave and we remain subsident for a bit behind the feature. Later Thursday afternoon into Thursday night, focus will shift upstream to the next shortwave embedded within the flow. Some sort of cluster and/or clusters of showers and storms are expected to develop upstream ahead of this feature, and then work into our area later Thursday night into Friday. This cluster is expected to carry a Damaging Wind threat along with heavy rainfall capable of producing Flash Flooding. There isn't a whole lot of deep layer shear available for strong MCS maintenance (20-25 knots with the synoptic flow), however if you can get enough of a cold pool going from clusters of storms, we do have some lingering elevated instability over our area into the overnight to support sustained forward propagating convection. As a result, we'll carry a damaging wind threat into late Thursday night/Friday morning which matches with the SPC Day 2 Outlook nicely. W/NW CWA will have the greatest threat with lower confidence farther east given the diurnal minimum and uncertainty in how much of a cold pool push the convective complex will have.

The other threat will be heavy rainfall given PWATs approaching 2" through the column and already wet antecedent conditions across the area. Not loving the 08/12z HREF 48 QPF Max and LPMM data for our area through Friday morning. It shows several pockets of 3-7" QPF amounts. It should be noted that some of that rainfall is from this afternoon (Wed afternoon), but still those are concerning amounts as these products have handled the "high-end" potential quite well with our recent rainfall events. Flood Watch was lifted for the entire CWA starting Thursday afternoon and running through late Saturday evening to account for the multi-wave threat.

That multi-wave threat will continue into the weekend as shortwaves continue to eject into our area from upstream, likely creating training convective clusters with each wave. It is possible that any one of these waves (including Thursday night's) could have enough of a cold pool push to push the overall convectively reinforced boundary farther south. Two favorable things could come from this. 1.) The axis of heavier rainfall could shift from the northern CWA to the southern, or 2.) the axis of heavier rainfall could shift farther south into TN. Any wave in this series of waves that can be dodged will be helpful. Worst case scenario would be the same area getting hit with each wave. Flooding could become quite severe if that scenario played out. Will continue to message significant flooding possibilities into the weekend given the antecedent wet conditions, possibilities of some high end rainfall totals in spots, and intense rainfall rates overwhelming urban or already saturated grounds. Turn Around, Don't Drown!

By later Saturday night into Sunday morning, there is decent agreement that the upper trough axis of the final shortwave will start to slide south through our area, cutting off the deeper moisture and the shortwave feed. Strong upper ridging will build across the central CONUS with the eastern fringes trying to win out over our area as we go into Sunday. Will keep some lingering shower chances in our CWA during this time, but overall not to the magnitude we saw late week into the first part of the weekend. Expecting highs mostly in the mid 80s each day.

LONG TERM /SUNDAY THROUGH WEDNESDAY/

Issued at 311 PM EDT Wed Jul 8 2026

Ridging building over the Intermountain West and Great Plains looks to expand eastward toward/into the region by the end of the weekend, though model differences exist in the northeastward extent of that ridge. From WPC's cluster analysis, about 70% of long-range ensemble membership builds the ridge solidly into our area - favoring an increasingly warm and dry pattern early next week - while the remaining 30% would suggest a less amplified ridge that favors near- normal temperatures and allows disturbances to trigger thunderstorms.

AVIATION /00Z TAFS THROUGH 06Z FRIDAY/

Issued at 739 PM EDT Wed Jul 8 2026

VFR conditions outside of ongoing storms will continue through the night. Visibilities may drop to the high end MVFR category in storms along with lightning and VRB winds. By 04-05Z, storms should dissipate with clouds slowly breaking up by the early morning hours. Light to calm winds may allow fog to form in a few of our airports in the morning, dropping visibilities though fog will be short lived and mix away by 12Z. VFR conditions will continue tomorrow afternoon before another more prominent line of storms approaches from the west towards the very end of the TAF period bringing gusty winds and lowered visibilities.

LMK WATCHES/WARNINGS/ADVISORIES

KY...Flood Watch from Thursday afternoon through late Saturday night for KYZ023>043-045>049-053>057-061>067-070>078-081- 082. IN...Flood Watch from Thursday afternoon through late Saturday night for INZ076>079-083-084-089>092.