870
FXUS64 KLZK 032312
AFDLZK

Area Forecast Discussion
National Weather Service Little Rock AR
612 PM CDT Thu Jul 3 2025

...New AVIATION...

.KEY MESSAGES...
Issued at 123 PM CDT Thu Jul 3 2025

+ A gradual warmup continues as we head into the holiday weekend
with highs climbing into the mid 90s by Saturday and Sunday. The
build up of heat looks to hold steady from there however without
getting significantly warmer or cooler next work week.

+ While each afternoon will feature a small chance of
thunderstorms during the peak heating hours of the day, the
coverage of storms is expected to increase a bit beginning Sunday
afternoon continuing on with slightly more active afternoon
thunderstorm activity across the state each day in the work week
ahead.

+ At this time it looks like the heat risk and associated high
heat index values will remain just barely below heat advisory
criteria. That`s not to say it won`t be hot and humid in the
forecast, it`s just conditions are expected to reflect more
typical Arkansas summer days, not necessarily unusually hot and
humid.

Cavanaugh

&&

.DISCUSSION...
Issued at 123 PM CDT Thu Jul 3 2025

Early afternoon water vapor satellite imagery showed a broad ridge
over the central CONtinental United States (CONUS) with troughs
anchoring either side of the upper level ridge. Closer to home
here in Arkansas surface observations showed early afternoon
temperatures in the upper 80s to low 90s across the state while
visible satellite imagery showed a surface based stratocumulus
deck over most of the state. Over southern Arkansas some thicker
and multilayered cloud cover was observed and consistent with some
isolated rain showers and thunderstorms active over southwest and
south central portions of the state.

While the upper air pattern described above looks a lot like a
blocking pattern that would typically result in a heat dome
building over Arkansas, that is not the case this time around. The
primary reason for this appears to be that the ridge simply isn`t
strong enough for the positive feedback loop to create a big dome
of heat reinforced high pressure over the region. The dynamics
aloft that bring the strongest large scale forcing for subsidence
exist over the northern plains allowing the base of the ridge to
remain dotted with largely unorganized thunderstorm complexes over
much of Texas and Oklahoma. This is good news for us here in
Arkansas because it will prevent us from getting locked into a
multi-week heatwave. All that said, it`s still July in Arkansas,
it`s not going to be cool by any stretch of the imagination, but
the displaced dynamics and deep low-level moisture trapped in the
ridge base will allow the ridge to weaken as we move through the
holiday weekend into early next week.

Under the strongest influence of the ridge, the next couple of
days will continue to feature a gradual warmup over Arkansas.
Expect temperatures on Independence day to be about a degree
warmer than this afternoon, and then a degree or two warmer still
on Saturday before the ridge begins to weaken and temperatures
more or less stabilize repeating Saturday`s temperatures on Sunday
afternoon. Each afternoon will feature shower and thunderstorm
chances, but precipitation chances remain fairly low tomorrow and
through the weekend. A 20-30 percent chance of a pop-up shower or
thunderstorm will be in the forecast each day for this holiday
weekend, however most locations are expected to remain dry. The
best chance for storms will generally be during the mid to later
afternoon hours each day, with activity generally diminishing
after sunset. While a collapsing thunderstorm may provide some
locally gusty winds, severe weather is generally not expected
through the weekend.

As we move into the next work week the flow aloft over Arkansas
changes from being dominated by upper level ridging to finding the
state in between ridge axes with one over the four corners region
of the southwest CONUS and the other over the southeast CONUS.
Being in between two ridges places Arkansas under a flow regime
for the start of the work week that is weak but not strongly
subsident or favoring ascent. In topography this area between
ridges is often referred to as a saddle or `col`, in
meteorological terms this regime favors a large scale deformation
zone, and in mathematics/physics the flow field is described as
hyperbolic flow. After you`ve picked your favorite descriptor for
the flow aloft, we can move on to the so what portion of the
discussion. So what?

This type of flow regime supports large scale convergence and the
reason it doesn`t just promote lift like low-level convergence
does is that large scale convergence promotes both lift and
sinking motions when applied to just about the entire column of
the atmosphere. It`s sort of like the atmosphere playing the
world`s weakest version of tug of war and it typically results in
whatever has been happening will continue to happen under the
region where this flow persists. As a result, Monday through
Wednesday of the week ahead will look pretty much exactly like the
upcoming weekend. Expect it to be hot and humid, but not
excessively so, and expect that eventually, consistent convergence
will build low-level moisture depth enough to result in a few
additional showers and storms each day over Arkansas during the
peak heating hours of of the day. So early next week pretty much
looks like Saturday and Sunday with slightly higher rain chances
each afternoon. Still not expecting severe storms or anything like
that.

The pattern may shift a bit as we move into late next week where
upper level troughing begins to replace the stagnant flow field
aloft. That could mean temperatures will be a degree or two cooler
towards the end of the week with slightly higher rain/storm
chances. We`ll know more as we get a bit closer in time to late
next week, but that appears to be the general trend this far out.

Cavanaugh

&&

.AVIATION...
(00Z TAFS)
Issued at 607 PM CDT Thu Jul 3 2025

For the 00Z TAFs...VFR conditions are expected through the valid
forecast period with light and generally southerly winds. The only
fly in the ointment in the forecast is accounting for the isolated
thunderstorms that will develop across Arkansas during the peak
heating hours of the day tomorrow. Coverage is expected to be
10-20 percent across the state, so confidence in a storm hitting a
particular TAF site is simply too low to include a mention in any
TAFs at this time. May add a mention of rain in the TAFs in later
forecast if it looks like any storm will hit a particular TAF
site.

Cavanaugh

&&

.PRELIMINARY POINT TEMPS/POPS...
Batesville AR     70  92  71  94 /   0   0   0   0
Camden AR         73  94  74  97 /  10  30   0  10
Harrison AR       69  89  69  89 /   0  10   0  10
Hot Springs AR    72  93  73  95 /   0  30   0  10
Little Rock   AR  73  94  73  95 /   0  10   0   0
Monticello AR     73  94  73  97 /   0  10   0   0
Mount Ida AR      71  91  72  93 /  10  40   0  10
Mountain Home AR  69  90  69  91 /   0   0   0  10
Newport AR        72  93  73  94 /   0   0   0   0
Pine Bluff AR     72  93  72  95 /   0  10   0   0
Russellville AR   73  93  73  94 /   0  20   0  10
Searcy AR         71  93  71  95 /   0   0   0   0
Stuttgart AR      73  92  73  94 /   0   0   0   0

&&

.LZK WATCHES/WARNINGS/ADVISORIES...
None.
&&

$$

SHORT TERM...LONG TERM...AVIATION...Cavanaugh