Fort Riley North, KS Weather

Key Messages

- Cooler today with rain chances coming to an end this morning. Some isolated showers and weak storms may return late tonight into Wednesday morning.

- Next rain/storm chances return by Wednesday night as a cold front moves into northern Kansas. Any storms are expected to remain sub- severe.

- The best chances (50-70%) for rain/storms come Thursday night into Saturday morning then again on Monday.

Discussion

Issued at 306 AM CDT Tue Oct 27 2026

Latest water vapor imagery this morning shows a subtle shortwave working its way into eastern Kansas as a deeper shortwave pushes into the northern Rockies/Plains. The shortwave over Kansas has deepened an inverted trough over central and northeastern Kansas that has increased low-level isentropic ascent across the CWA. Light showers continue within this corridor of ascent. As the shortwave slowly moves into western Missouri later this morning, subsidence behind the wave should bring a quick end to precipitation. Given the ample cloud cover and weak troughing across the area, temperatures will not warm much this afternoon, topping out in the lower 70s with some upper 60s across far north-central Kansas. Overnight tonight, the shortwave over the northern Rockies region begins to move into the WY Basin with subtle mid-level energy embedded in the southwest flow to its south. The subtle cooling aloft ahead of the shortwave axis and low-level isentropic ascent may be enough to develop some isolated to scattered showers/weak thunderstorms in the early morning hours Wednesday.

The shortwave over the northern Plains will continue to track east through the day Wednesday and help to push a lee surface trough ahead through the region. As the surface trough moves across the Plains, tight pressure gradients will return gusty southerly flow across Kansas and push a corridor of 60 degree Tds into eastern Kansas. The surface boundary tracks into northern Kansas by the later afternoon/evening creating a focal point for showers and storms. Storms that do develop along the front in the evening will likely remain sub-severe given the lack of deep shear aloft, but given RAP analysis depicting 1000-1500 J/kg of MLCAPE, a few storms could briefly be on the stronger side.

Persistent rain/storm chances (30-60%) look to continue again Thursday night into Friday morning as the surface boundary stalls near the KS/NE border. With warm and moist southerly flow overriding the boundary, widespread showers will be expected. This will quickly be follow up with the next system moving in from the southern Plains, keeping rain and storm chances across the region into Saturday (50-70%). Given the precipitation chances and ample cloud cover, temperatures will not warm much above the low 70 Saturday into next week. The active pattern appears to remain in place as we head into next week. That said, some dry weather should find eastern Kansas by Saturday night into most of Sunday as subsidence and mid- level ridging build in from the southwest.

Aviation

Issued at 1229 AM CDT Tue Oct 27 2026

Rain showers will shortly move into the KMHK terminal with showers expected to persist until around sunrise today. High-res models keep MVFR and IFR CIGs further west behind the cold front, but could see some scattered lower decks accompany rain showers at KMHK. KTOP and KFOE will remain mostly dry with rain mostly falling apart by mid morning. Cannot rule out some isolated showers, but confidence in the coverage of showers was not enough to add mention at this point. The remainder of the period will see VFR stratus overspreading the terminals as the boundary layer mixes out through the afternoon.

Top Watches

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