Area Forecast Discussion National Weather Service Kansas City/Pleasant Hill MO 612 PM CDT Tue Jul 14 2026 .KEY MESSAGES... - Temperatures will continue to gradually climb over the next several days, with highs in the middle 90s forecast this weekend and upper 90s by next Monday. - Showers and thunderstorms return on Thursday afternoon, with a 40-60 chance of precipitation for areas south of Highway 36. These storms could pose a threat for locally heavy rainfall. - Heat index values will reach the upper 90s to lower 100s by Friday and persist into early next week. .DISCUSSION... Issued at 150 PM CDT Tue Jul 14 2026 Currently, the area remains under the influence of broad upper high pressure, which remains anchored across much of the central United States. This has again led to quiet weather across much of Missouri and eastern Kansas, with light easterly winds and temperatures in the upper 80s. Surface high pressure, currently centered over central Iowa, is expected to remain largely anchored in place tonight. The position of this surface high will allow for persistent very light winds across northern Missouri, and efficient radiational cooling should lead to patchy fog development early tomorrow morning. The threat for any patchy fog looks to remain generally along and north of HWY 36. By tomorrow, a weak upper low will drift west out of the Mid- South, on the southern periphery of the aforementioned upper level high pressure. The approach of this shortwave should allow for richer surface moisture to advect into southern Missouri by tomorrow afternoon, as a weak warm front lifts northwards. It will be near and south of this boundary where scattered shower and thunderstorm development is expected, though it appears this activity will remain off to the south of the area. The richer surface dewpoints finally arrive by Thursday, as the aforementioned weak surface boundary lifts north across the area. Increasing instability, combined with ample diurnal heating, should allow for scattered to widespread shower and thunderstorm development amid a largely uncapped environment across much of western Missouri and eastern Kansas. Forecast soundings suggest very weak deep layer shear, with upper level winds remaining very weak (H5 flow 5-10kts). This suggests little to no updraft organization and should temper the threat for any severe weather outside of damaging winds from any wet microbursts. That said, a general lack of dry air aloft does cast doubt on any microburst threat for now. The more prevalent threat looks to be locally heavy rainfall, as weak steering flow should lead to slow storm motions. Add in PWAT values approaching/exceeding 2 (90th percentile climo for mid-July) and very deep warm cloud depths, any storms that form should be efficient rainfall producers. A threat for localized flash flooding appears possible on Thursday, and trends will continue to be monitored closely. Upper ridging then begins to establish again across the central Plains by late week, with drier conditions returning by Friday and into the weekend. This will also lead to temperatures increasing yet again, into the middle to upper 90s this weekend and early next week. The warmest day looks to be Monday, as increasing warm advection ahead of an approaching boundary brings in much warmer temperatures aloft. This could promote temperatures nearing the 100 mark, and NBM probabilities have increased to as high as 30-40 for MaxT 100F across the KC Metro area. Unfortunately, these much warmer air temperatures could push heat index values in the 105-110 range early next week and lead to increasing heat concerns across the area. .AVIATION /00Z TAFS THROUGH 00Z THURSDAY/... Issued at 612 PM CDT Tue Jul 14 2026 VFR conditions through the TAF period. Few to scattered clouds with cigs around 4500 ft this evening will become mostly clear overnight. Winds turn more northeasterly overnight tonight but stay under 10kt. Could see some patchy fog or haze in north- central and northwestern Missouri, impacting KSTJ for a few hours from 10-12Z. No precip expected through tomorrow. .EAX WATCHES/WARNINGS/ADVISORIES... MO...None. KS...None. DISCUSSION...Brown AVIATION...McCoy