UPDATE: Friday night rumbles on and off the grid iron as cold front brings chance of strong storms

(WOWK) A cold front is expected to cross our region this evening through Saturday morning bringing that fall crisp feel back along with the chance of a few strong storms just in time for Friday night football.

Southwest winds today have boosted surface temperatures into the mid and upper 80s. Our cold front will utilize this added energy to fire up scattered thunderstorms towards the late evening from 6pm on. At first, storms will be spotty typical of late summer downpours. One or two could continue to grow with torrential localized rainfall, small hail, and gusty winds. Lightning will be the main risk to area football games and may delay a few.

The bulk of the energy and storms activity will come later after sunset, before midnight. As the cold front moves in, storms along it will begin to group together in clusters. These will be the height of our severe weather risks.

Our severe weather risk primarily will be damaging winds with 30-40mph winds in a few strong storms, with one or two storms pushing into the severe 50-60mph range. These severe storms will be limited in numbers but impactful to the small areas they run into. The strongest of storms could bring damaging hail up to 1 inch in diameter. The risk for tornadoes isn’t exceptionally high but worth at least mentioning. With strong cold front, quick spin-up tornadoes can develop in the strongest of storms.

Once the front itself pushes out of the region and farther east, our severe weather threat will come to an end in the pre-dawn hours. Winds will remain elevated as cooler northwest winds rush in behind the front. A few rumbles of thunder into the twilight hours and pre-dawn Saturday will remain possible.

Gloomy conditions for Saturday morning and early afternoon and cooler air squeezes out available humidity from the sky. Showers will be light in nature with a damp and cool feel to the afternoon. Clearing skies will move in from west to east into Saturday night bringing and end to the rain for all. Temperatures will drop farther back into the 50 for overnight lows. Fog will certainly be something to watch for heading out Sunday morning.

With the extra clouds and cooler air rushing in behind the front, highs on Saturday will certainly take some by surprise after a warm upper 80s for Friday as we struggle into the low 70s by Saturday afternoon.

Don’t forget to check in with the StormTracker 13 team for a complete look at your forecast.