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Q2 Weather: A quick warm up with showers Thursday in Billings

Posted at 2:48 PM, Sep 06, 2018
and last updated 2018-09-06 16:49:14-04

BILLINGS- The sun is out and the temperatures are already warming up into the 80s for the crowd of people gathering outside the Rimrock Auto Arena for President Donald Trump’s rally.

The big question is, will there be any showers moving into south-central Montana this afternoon? And the answer is maybe.

The thunderstorm outlook for Thursday shows isolated showers moving in from southwestern Montana and could go as far east as Billings.

In fact, the Doppler radar is already showing a couple of lines of showers moving in from the southwest. A few storms in Beaverhead and Madison counties are already producing thunder and lightning.

It looks like they may either go up and over or around the Beartooth Mountains before they move into the Billings area.

However, our high-resolution forecast model shows the showers will experience downsloping winds as they come off the mountains, effectively drying them up before they make it to Billings.

After that, the model shows mostly sunny skies continuing into Friday afternoon for most of Eastern Montana.

The temperature in Billings will be into the low to mid 80s in the early afternoon rolling back to the 60s overnight and then back to the 80s again on Friday.

BILLINGS FORECAST

TONIGHT: Partly cloudy with a 20 percent chance for showers and thunderstorms in the evening, some storms may produce gusty winds. East winds 5 to 15 mph in the evening becoming northwesterly 5 to 10 mph overnight. Low 55 degrees.

FRIDAY: Mostly sunny with Southwest winds 5 to 10 mph. High 89 degrees.

SATURDAY: Mostly sunny with a 20 percent chance for showers and thunderstorms in the afternoon. West winds 5 to 15 mph. High 83 degrees.