FXUS63 KAPX 150913 AFDAPX Area Forecast Discussion National Weather Service Gaylord MI 513 AM EDT Wed Apr 15 2026 .KEY MESSAGES... - Heavy rain and storm concerns continue today/tonight into Thursday... - Breezy with additional rain/storm concerns Saturday... - Snow possible Sunday... && .DISCUSSION... Issued at 511 AM EDT Wed Apr 15 2026 .DISCUSSION... PATTERN SYNOPSIS/FORECAST: Westerly flow across the PacNW...with a SW-NE oriented longwave trough axis stretching from Baja California into the northern Plains (a couple embedded PV maxima over CO...central SD...and just north of Lake Superior). Ridge axis prevails across the southeastern US...with zonal flow across eastern Canada. Continued plume of anomalous moisture stretching from TX through the MS Valley into the Upper Great Lakes, where pwats exceed 1in. Flow is a bit split across the central US, with a boundary stretching from the Desert SW to the OH Valley/Upper Great Lakes and attendant southwesterly low- level flow...and a northern stream system developing in southern Alberta/Saskatchewan, with warm advection into Manitoba. Cold air (subzero at 850mb) currently across northern/central Canada, attendant to a stationary boundary stretching from British Columbia to Hudson Bay. Michigan stuck in the battlezone...with temps in the lower 40s across the EUP...and lower 60s across southern MI where convection continues; things have largely quieted down across northern MI as of 6z...save for a few showers developing along a subtle deformation area over the eastern UP. Nearly to completely saturated conditions at the surface in the wake of said convection, even up into the UP...and noting quite a bit of fog and low stratus upstream from us, into the Yoop/Tip of the Mitt. Bit of a pattern shift in the works for the latter half of the period...with signals for troughing trying (though not very successfully) to settle into the eastern half of the continent at times in the coming days...particularly late in the weekend into early next week. In the meantime... aforementioned shortwave troughing over the SW US looks to track northeastward into the Midwest late tonight into Thursday...bringing our next shot at showers and storms. Ridging to build immediately behind this for Thursday night into Friday...as southwesterly flow increases ahead of troughing digging into the western US/central Canada. This latter feature will track into the Midwest through the weekend, driving a strong surface low through the Midwest/eastern Canada Friday night into Saturday. Timing of the front is a bit unclear attm but signals point toward cold advection returning at some point on Saturday or Saturday night...cold enough that the "S" word may rear its head again...with breezy northwest/west flow picking up again into Sunday...before high pressure attempts to build in going into early next week...potentially followed by another shot at cold air for the end of the period and beyond. FORECAST DETAILS... Storms today/tonight...expecting the round of rain/storms currently across IA to lift northeastward into Lower MI this morning through mid afternoon. Think the atmosphere has been quite stabilized across northern Michigan after this evening's "fun"...and with stable but murky conditions across the Yoop and WI likely to seep eastward behind a subtle trough axis this morning...which could keep the bulk of the activity south of our area (which is just as well). However...if by some chance the boundary ends up stalling further north or lifts further north quicker than expected...may need to keep an eye on the Manistee River basin this morning, with a little bit of hi-res guidance suggesting it's not impossible there could be 0.25in or so of additional rainfall this morning there. Otherwise...think we will not be as able to achieve instability as we have the last couple days/nights...and may keep things a little tamer, at least for the daytime hours. This being said...if we do manage to break into any sun...low LCLs could become a problem again late, particularly as deep layer shear looks to ramp up again tonight as the LLJ strengthens again...and anticipate another round of stronger storms will remain possible for the latter half of the day into the overnight...though this all depends on the evolution of upstream convection today and tonight ahead of the upstream shortwave axis. Best shot at anything trying to get spicy this afternoon will be near and south of M-72 again, and particularly over toward Saginaw Bay, where things could become uncapped with enough mixing and a northward-enough surge of the warm front today...though some of the more aggressive hi-res guidance would like to develop some activity as far north as the Tip of the Mitt into northeast Lower. Concerning rain today through Thursday...anomalous moisture combined with continued forcing will keep the threat of heavy rain focused across the region. The convective aspect could certainly remain further south, leaving us in a more stratiform area again...and even stratiform rains have potential to be productive, noting the warm cloud layer depth could be close to 3km and supportive of more efficient warm rain processes later this afternoon into tonight. Think the best shot at seeing better accumulations will remain near and south of M-72 (where it is also not needed)...but especially near and south of M-55, with prob guidance highlighting central Lower into Saginaw Bay for an inch or better of rain (70+ percent chance). Not impossible there could be a bit better deformation band/trowal-esque axis tonight, given potential for a more well- defined shortwave trough this time around...and this could favor a shot at a swath of more productive rainfall from late tonight/early Thursday morning through Thursday afternoon. If this idea comes to fruition...it is (unfortunately) possible it may stretch from NW Lower up into perhaps the Tip of the Mitt region, where hi-res probs suggest there is a low-end shot (20 percent or less) at seeing more than an inch of additional rain in 24hrs thru Thursday afternoon. After a brief reprieve late Thursday into part of Friday...our next shot of rain/storms returns Friday night into Saturday. Appears we should be looking at another slug of anomalous moisture as a more dynamic system moves through. Will have to be on the lookout for more heavy rain concerns, which could be focused at times by fgen, particularly along the cold front Saturday, though this feature would be quicker moving (in theory). Attm...long range prob guidance does hint at potential for around an inch of additional precip (likely rain) Friday night through Sunday morning, though attm potential is low (15 percent or less), which could be attributed to some uncertainty in how the convective aspect plays out...and will need to keep an eye on this. Snow potential returns on the backside of the system Saturday night into Sunday as temperatures fall quite dramatically...850mb temps drop back below 0C, and perhaps as low as -10C to -15C by Sunday, which would crank up overlake instability again on brisk northwest to west flow. High temperatures potentially in the 30s on Sunday, combined with overnight lows falling back to or below freezing...could lead to some accumulations. Fortunately this may only be a quick shot of cold air...otherwise, a prolonged period of cold could further complicate our soggy hydro situation up here. && .AVIATION /06Z TAFS THROUGH 06Z THURSDAY/... Issued at 118 AM EDT Wed Apr 15 2026 Expect areas of BR/FG tonight into Wednesday morning with areas of IFR to LIFR CIGs. VSBYs expected to decrease across all terminals, with ~1/2 SM or potentially lower at times for some. VSBYs increase during the day with a few terminals seeing VSBYs slowly improve through the day on Wednesday. Chance for a few -SHRA/VCSH for KMBL up towards KAPN. Generally light winds are expected. && .APX WATCHES/WARNINGS/ADVISORIES... MI...Flood Watch through late Thursday night for MIZ016>018-020>036- 041-042-086>088-095-096-099. MARINE...None. && $$ DISCUSSION...FEF AVIATION...JLD