textproduct: Twin Cities

KEY MESSAGES

- THIS WEEKEND AND NEXT WEEK, a prolonged heat wave with hot and dry conditions. Expect several days with highs in the low 90s, and heat indices of 95 to 100 degrees.

DISCUSSION

Issued at 144 PM CDT Fri Jul 10 2026

Today and tonight...Early afternoon satellite imagery showed partly cloudy skies across Minnesota and Wisconsin, with a weak pressure gradient leading to light surface winds. In western Minnesota, temperatures were in the low 80s, with dewpoints in the low 70s. This led to a couple thousand J/kg of MLCAPE. Meanwhile, dewpoints decrease toward eastern Minnesota and western Wisconsin, which led to lower CAPE values in those areas.

The low level moisture is a good proxy for where thunderstorms chances are highest later this afternoon and evening, which is mainly across western and central Minnesota. Forcing is light, so these will be more random, pop-up in nature. Winds are also light, meaning the wind shear is low, and this will be the limiting factor on severe weather potential. The Storm Prediction Center maintains the marginal risk for severe hail and wind, which seems appropriate for a few of the strongest storms. Most locations will stay dry.

Storms will fall apart after sunset once they lose the peak heating. Winds will remain light, so did introduce some patchy fog to the weather grids for overnight into Saturday morning.

Saturday through Friday...The main concern for this weekend and beyond is hot, summer temperatures. This will be a prolonged heat wave, but the magnitude won't be as severe as the one in late June to early July. The reason is dewpoints will be a bit lower, so the heat indices will be lower.

However, this drier air mass will mean that the chance of "breaking" the heat wave with clouds and thunderstorms will be low. In fact, very little rainfall is expected the next 7 days.

In summary, we expect several days with highs in the low 90s, and minimum nightly temperatures in the upper 60s to low 70s. If this forecast remains on track, that would lead to Heat Advisory headlines being needed starting Sunday, and lasting into early next week.

AVIATION /06Z TAFS THROUGH 12Z SUNDAY/

Issued at 1224 AM CDT Sat Jul 11 2026

Solid VFR conditions expected throughout this duration. Mainly clear skies overnight through tomorrow, possibly with some fair wx mid-level diurnal cumulus clouds during the day. Light/variable winds overnight become southerly during the day Saturday with speeds under 10kts.

KMSP...No additional concerns.

/OUTLOOK FOR KMSP/ MON-WED...VFR. Wind SW around 10kts.

MPX WATCHES/WARNINGS/ADVISORIES

MN...None. WI...None.