BILLINGS — We have partly cloudy skies in the Billings area Thursday afternoon. It's 87 degrees under those partly cloudy skies with a southeast wind at 6 mph.
Around the rest of the state, the temps are mostly into the 70s and 80s in the west, but look at all the 90s, back in the east. Many places are already into the mid-90s, and probably going higher.
The Doppler radar shows some light rain showers moving through Yellowstone County Thursday afternoon. Some of these are very light an may just bring a couple sprinkles to the Billings area.
Some of the heavier storms seem to be just south of Bozeman and near Big Timber and continue to track toward the northeast at about 30 mph. Some of the storms do contain 50 mile-per-hour wind gusts, but they're still considered not severe at this time.
The high-resolution forecast model shows the area highlighted in green. That's where we could see a marginal risk of severe storms Thursday. Looks like Billings could see pretty big thunderstorms moving in about 4:30 p.m.
After that, they track up toward the northeast, and we will be left with mostly clear skies on Friday morning. We might see and a few scattered showers in Billings by 8:30 p.m. Friday.
On Saturday, we expect mostly sunny skies throughout much of the day and temperatures will be somewhat cooler.
However, Thursday night we will cool down to the 50s and 60s across much of south-central and eastern Montana as the showers and thunderstorms continue to track from the southwest to the northeast.
Friday it's back to the 70s, 80s and even a few low 90s with a Fire Weather Watch for much of the afternoon and evening for the central part of the state. The watch does not include Billings.
It will be 95 degrees at 5:30 p.m. Thursday, cooling back down to the 60s in the morning and back to the low to mid 80s Saturday afternoon.
We will top out at 88 on Friday, 89 Saturday, then down the 82 for the high on Sunday. We will climb back up into the low 90s on Tuesday and Wednesday.
BILLINGS FORECAST
TONIGHT: Partly cloudy with a 20% chance for isolated showers and thunderstorms this evening, then mostly clear skies late tonight. Northwest winds 5 to 15 mph. Low 64 degrees.
FRIDAY: Sunny and not as hot. Northwest winds 5 to 15 mph. High 88 degrees.
SATURDAY: Sunny and continued not as warm. North winds 5 to 10 mph, shifting to the Southwest in the afternoon. High 89 degrees.
