Southwest

Weather Underground midday recap for Saturday, July 11, 2009.

Unsettling weather activity developed across areas of the Eastern US due to significant instability near a front that extended from the Plains through eastern Canada. Ahead of this front, bands of showers and thunderstorms moved through the lower Great Lakes to the western areas of New England. Additional precipitation and thunderstorms popped up in the Mid-Mississippi and Ohio Valleys. Meanwhile, warming across the Tennessee Valley led to heightened instability throughout this region. Increasing instability throughout the afternoon put areas from eastern Kentucky to western New York at slight risk for severe weather development. Thus far, strong and damaging winds have developed across western New York.

Meanwhile, active weather also developed in the Northern and Central Plains. While, strong thunderstorms began to weaken across Nebraska, afternoon warming created isolated thunderstorms a slight chance for severe weather activity from eastern Colorado to southeastern Wyoming.

Elsewhere, the remainder of the East saw fairly dry weather as high pressure dominated the region. In the West, a low pressure system located just off the West Coast produced mostly dry and mild conditions with areas of coastal fog across the Pacific Northwest and California. Hot weather persisted across the Southwest.

Temperatures in the Lower 48 states Saturday have ranged from a morning low of 36 degrees at Stanley, Idaho to a midday high of 106 degrees at Blythe, Calif.