textproduct: Springfield

KEY MESSAGES

- Elevated fire danger today and tomorrow with hot, dry, and increasingly breezy conditions.

- High confidence in temperatures 10-20 degrees above climatological averages today through Tuesday. Highs in the upper 80s to lower 90s will challenge some records.

- Increasing confidence in chances for widespread rainfall late Tuesday through Thursday.

SHORT TERM /THROUGH MONDAY/

Issued at 105 PM CDT Sun Oct 11 2026

Satellite imagery shows the majority of the central CONUS under mostly clear skies as an upper level ridge builds over the region. Isaias remnants continue to track up through the Tennessee/Ohio Valleys to our east, with the associated cloud deck over much of the northeast/eastern CONUS. Additionally, a midlevel closed low and associated troughing pattern continues to push southeast towards the Central Great Basin region as it begins to ingest some post-tropical systems, covering much of the western CONUS under its associated cloud deck.

With the midlevel heights rising and southwesterly winds nudging 850mb temps between 18-20C, afternoon highs are expected to climb a few more degrees from the current observations, peaking in the upper 80s and near 90 for the entirety of the area. This will come close to record highs (see Climate section below), so we'll continue to monitor how temperatures trend over the next few hours. Monday will bring similar temperatures, once again challenging record highs.

Southwesterly winds have been gusting up to 20-25mph so far this morning and early afternoon primarily west of Highway 65 as 25-30kt low level jet stream flow has been mixing down to the surface. With the dry airmass in place, relative humidity values have already dipped into the 30-40% range over the majority of the area, and are expected to continue decreasing over the next few hours. Areas west of Highway 65 that are experiencing the stronger winds will thankfully not align with the driest air, and should continue to experience RHs in the 30-40% range through this evening. East of the highway, RHs should drop down into the 20-30% range, with wind gusts remaining minimal. As a result, elevated fire danger is expected to continue through the remainder of this afternoon and into the evening for areas along/west of Highway 65 where the strongest winds are.

Monday will bring a similar situation, however HREF probabilities of wind gusts >30mph increase (50-75+%) and spread eastward past the Highway 65 corridor. Elevated fire danger will once again be in play for Monday, overspreading a large portion of the forecast area. As the previous discussion mentioned, a lack of sufficient rainfall has led to dry and susceptible fuels - see the fire section below for more details on fuel index information.

LONG TERM /MONDAY NIGHT THROUGH SATURDAY/

Issued at 105 PM CDT Sun Oct 11 2026

Tuesday will once again bring record-challenging temperatures as the ridge continues to build over the region. The NBM interquartile spread only shows a 4-degree difference between the 25th to 75th percentiles, leading to fairly high confidence in temperatures surpassing 90 degrees for the entirety of the forecast area. This will likely be the hottest day in the forecast period, with records at all climate sites in jeopardy.

The previously mentioned closed low and ingested tropical systems will continue over the desert southwest on Tuesday, with upper level energy and moisture content beginning to filter into the area ahead of the trough by Tuesday evening. Despite continued discrepancies between ensembles, there's been an increase in both the precipitation chances and the QPF probabilities since previous forecasts. A cold front is progged to drop south into the area late Tuesday into Wednesday before stalling out and lifting northeast on Thursday ahead of a secondary cold front that sweeps through Thursday night into Friday. If this scenario were to play out, we'd see a prolonged period of rainfall spanning across multiple days. Current NBM 24-hour QPF probabilities showcase the following:

> 1": 55-85% > 2": 35-65% > 3": <30%

with rain chances increasing Tuesday night (20-50%), peaking on Wednesday (85-95%), continuing on Thursday (60-80%), before decreasing Thursday night (20-40%). That being said, there is a scenario where the system stalls out to the west, effectively canceling out rain chances for some locations. So the positioning of this system and how it evolves will be put under intense scrutiny over the next few days until we get a better idea of how it will evolve.

Another area we're monitoring is the severe weather chances. With the warm airmass still in place during peak heating on Tuesday and dewpoints increasing to the upper 60s/low 70s, instability is expected to increase throughout the day. The better chances of severe weather occurring look to remain to our southwest over SW KS/western OK/TX panhandle, however as the evening progresses and showers/storms begin to push into our northwest overnight, we could see an isolated severe threat. SPC has introduced a Marginal (Level 1 of 5) risk over the northwest CWA to account for this potential, so we'll need to continue monitoring as we get closer to Tuesday.

Once this system moves through, cooler temperatures will be ushered into the area next weekend.

AVIATION /18Z TAFS THROUGH 18Z MONDAY/

Issued at 1211 PM CDT Sun Oct 11 2026

High confidence in VFR conditions prevailing through the TAF period. Southwest winds will continue gusting up to 20-25kts primarily at KJLN and KSGF before diminishing overnight at KSGF. Winds will increase once again after 12Z, gusting up to 20-25kts at KSGF and KBBG, and up to 25-30kts at KJLN through the remainder of the TAF period. Otherwise, LLWS will be possible at all sites between 07Z-14Z.

FIRE WEATHER

Issued at 101 AM CDT Sat Oct 10 2026

A prolonged period with substantial rainfall deficits from late Summer and into the Fall has contributed to worsening drought conditions across southwest Missouri and southeast Kansas. The latest Drought Monitor valid Oct 6 showed a continued expansion of the D3 (Extreme Drought) and an overall categorical degradation across the fire weather forecast area. Resultant fuel moisture indices show similar trends. Woody FM readings between 60-70 and Herb FM values of 30-60 suggest these fuels are cured or very dry. Combined, these produce a Growing Season Index (GSI) of 0.1 to 0.3, indicating fuel dormancy. Furthermore, KBDI values greater than 600 (and in some cases greater than 700) also suggest fuels are near or completely cured.

While Red Flag Warning (RFW) conditions are not forecast to be met in the next seven days, we will officially begin our fire weather season messaging, and headlines will be issued should RFW criteria be forecast from this point onward.

CLIMATE

Issued at 1232 PM CDT Sat Oct 10 2026

October 11: KSGF: 91/1963 KJLN: 91/2020 KVIH: 92/1963 KUNO: 93/1963

October 12: KSGF: 91/2024 KJLN: 93/2024 KVIH: 90/2024 KUNO: 87/1975

October 13: KSGF: 88/2017 KJLN: 88/1952 KVIH: 88/1899 KUNO: 93/1989

SGF WATCHES/WARNINGS/ADVISORIES

KS...None. MO...None.