May brings temperature surge, storm threats
The surging temperatures and gusty winds that mark the start of May on Thursday
bring two days of lake-cooling to a precipitous end. An accompanying moisture
increase, which will give the air a decidedly more spring-like feel, primes the
atmosphere for several showers and thunderstorms Thursday and a potentially more
important outbreak of storms and possible severe weather later Friday. Computer
wind trajectories indicate Thursday’s predicted 70s were over Tennessee, Mississippi
and the Gulf Coast near New Orleans only 24 hours ago.
May is the city’s third fastest warming month, with “normal” highs jumping from 64
degrees to 75 degrees.
Wednesday’s 31 degrees was the second sub-freezing low at O’Hare. Back to back
readings below 32 degrees have occurred this late in the season here in only three
other years in the past half century.
FROM 82 DEGREES TO A BIG SNOW—IN ONLY THREE DAYS!
Western South Dakota is bracing for near blizzard conditions. It was only Tuesday
that Rapid City topped out at 82 degrees. Up to 8 inches of wind-driven snow is
predicted there Thursday/Friday—and up to a foot in the Black Hills.