Reuters: U.S.: Storms brewing for Midwest before summer-like holiday weekend

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Storms brewing for Midwest before summer-like holiday weekend May 24th 2012, 20:00 By James B. Kelleher CHICAGO | Thu May 24, 2012 4:00pm EDT CHICAGO (Reuters) - Forecasters put seven states on alert for severe weather on Thursday, saying a storm system brewing in the Upper Mississippi Valley could spawn tornadoes later in the day. But the dangerous conditions Thursday were expected to dissipate overnight and give way to sunny, summer-like conditions across much of the country for the long Memorial Day weekend. The National Weather Service's Storm Prediction Center said severe thunderstorms with damaging winds and hail would rake portions of Kansas, Missouri, Iowa, Minnesota, Wisconsin, Illinois and Michigan on Thursday. The areas at greatest risk for tornadoes included much of Wisconsin and southeastern Minnesota, as well as northeastern Iowa, northwestern Illinois and a small part of Michigan's Upper Peninsula, the Weather Service said. "It looks like a nasty scenario shaping up for this afternoon and the early part of tonight," said Tom Kines, a senior meteorologist at the commercial forecasting firm Accuweather.com. But forecasters predicted the three-day holiday weekend - the traditional start of the U.S. summer vacation season - would be sunny and warm for much of the country, with temperatures in many cities 10 to 15 degrees above normal. "There's going to be a lot of heat building up not only across the Midwest and Ohio Valley but all the way to the East Coast," Kines said. "There might even be a few spots that hit a 100." Temperatures in Nashville over the weekend were expected to match - if not break - 101-year-old records, according to National Weather Service Meteorologist Sam Herron. "We're getting into summer mode," Herron said. In Chicago, where temperatures are expected to test longstanding records over the weekend and the beaches along Lake Michigan officially open on Friday, the city said it would no longer automatically ban swimming due to high bacteria counts, as it did 36 times last summer. A storm system brewing in the Pacific Northwest is expected to dramatically cool down the Southwest over the long weekend. Kines at Accuweather.com predicted Phoenix and Las Vegas would see a 15 to 20 degrees temperature drop. But the drop in the mercury will be accompanied by strong winds that could frustrate efforts to control wildfires burning in five western states, Kines said. (Additional reporting by Timothy Ghianni and Andrew Stern; Editing by Greg McCune and Philip Barbara) Link this Share this Digg this Email Reprints

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