WAUSAU − Northern Wisconsin, as far south as Marathon County, could experience high winds and a chance for hail the evening of June 20 as storms move across the region and bringing high temperatures and humidity.
A line of severe weather is forecast to form in northern Minnesota between 9 p.m. and midnight and move east across northern Wisconsin through the overnight hours, Timm Uhlmann, meteorologist with the National Weather Service in Green Bay, told a USA TODAY NETWORK-Wisconsin reporter.
Damaging winds and hail are the main severe risks of the storm in Wisconsin, Uhlmann said. Severe weather events that “evolve upstream of us” tend to be more wind-oriented by the time they arrive, Uhlmann explained.
Counties along the northern border of Wisconsin and Michigan’s upper peninsula are the most likely to be impacted by severe weather, Uhlmann said. An area of slight risk for severe weather extends as far south as Marathon County but a few weather models did not show the storms reaching that far south, Uhlmann said.
Other storms may produce rain and lightning in central Wisconsin beginning around 9 p.m. but the line of severe weather will not move through until after midnight, Uhlmann said. Storms should move east out of Wisconsin by 6 a.m. or 7 a.m.
The severe weather is along a front of warm air that will being triple-digit heat index values to central Wisconsin over the weekend, Uhlmann said.
Another round of active weather is expected June 23 that will bring a break from high temperatures with highs returning to the 70s, Uhlmann said. It is still too early to predict when Monday’s storms are expected or their intensity.
Uhlmann recommends keeping a flashlight or phone handy so that a power outage does not make it difficult to seek shelter in another room or basement in the dark during storms.
Erik Pfantz covers local government and education in central Wisconsin for USA TODAY NETWORK-Wisconsin and values his background as a rural Wisconsinite. Contact him at epfantz@gannett.com.
This article originally appeared on Wausau Daily Herald: High winds and hail forecast for Friday night. Will it impact central Wisconsin?
Reporting by Erik Pfantz, Wausau Daily Herald / Wausau Daily Herald
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