Key messages
- Warm weather continues into the weekend across much of our area with highs in the mid 70s to low 80s.
- Winds gusting to around 40-45 mph on Friday will be a concern for some limited fire impacts in areas with cured fuels. However, the strongest winds will not be co-located with the lowest RH values.
- Shower and storm chances increase this weekend into next week (60-80%). Expect a cooling trend from Sunday onward with highs reaching the 50s to low 60s by Tuesday.
Discussion
Issued at 126 PM CDT Thu Oct 22 2026
Scattered high clouds over NE Nebraska this afternoon. Otherwise its a mostly sunny day with highs forecast to get into the upper 70s to low 80s across most of our area this afternoon. Looking at the broader pattern we have a broad ridge over the Central Plains with troughs over California and the Appalachians.
Overnight tonight we'll see the LLJ ramp up across central into northeast Nebraska. With the nose of the LLJ right along the SD state line, any potential showers/storms should stay in South Dakota, but we do have slight-chance PoPs right near the state line. These stronger winds out of the south-southwest hang around into the day on Friday, mixing down to the surface mid- morning. We'll see fairly strong winds through Friday afternoon gusting 30-45 mph in NE Nebraska, 20-30 mph across SE Nebraska and SW Iowa. These winds are associated with that western trough shifting eastward with a developing low pressure system over eastern Montana.
This deepening low tracks northeast into NW North Dakota and Manitoba/Saskatchewan, but brings a trailing cold front into our area on Saturday. This front will stall, hanging around through Sunday with cooler temperatures north of the boundary, and highs staying in the mid-70s to low-80s south. Showers and storms will be possible along the front over NE Nebraska starting after midnight Saturday into Saturday morning. While initially precip will have to overcome a substantial amount of low-level dry air early Saturday morning, these chances increase Saturday evening into Sunday as we see persistent moisture pooling along the boundary overcome this dry air.
Models continue to trend later with the arrival of the upper- level trough which will push this frontal boundary through. Rain chances now aren't likely to spread across the rest of our area until late Sunday or early Monday. Cooler, rainy weather appears likely to hang around through Tuesday clearing out Wednesday as the upper-level trough brings a surface low through.
Weak ridging builds back in later next week, lowering precip chances. Ensembles show lower confidence in the forecast going into the latter half of the week due to timing differences in the passage of the upper-level trough as well as in the arrival and amplitude of the weak ridge moving in later in the week. Temperature spreads for highs go from mid 50s to low 70s for the Omaha area (25-75 percentile). The current forecast across our area is near the ensemble mean.
Aviation /00Z Tafs Through 00Z Saturday/
Issued at 635 PM CDT Thu Oct 22 2026
VFR conditions are anticipated through the night with winds enough to keep fog at bay. South-southeasterly winds will persist through the night, breeziest at KOFK where speeds will linger at about 10 knots through the night. Winds at FL015 will be blowing at about 185 degrees at speeds of 41 knots. This is not strong enough to hit criteria needed for TAF mention, but since it was included in an earlier TAF, I wanted to mention here.
Breezy southerly winds mix back to the sfc mid-day wight gusts of 25-32 knots expected out of the south.
Oax Watches/Warnings/Advisories
NE...None. IA...None.
DISCUSSION...McCoy AVIATION...Nicolaisen