A wet and sunny long weekend forecast for the southeast

If your long weekend plans include spending time outdoors, you might be rotating between an umbrella and sunglasses. 

Meteorologist Scott Kehler with Weatherlogics says the shower activity in southeastern Manitoba will hang on for the rest of Friday and into early Saturday, creating a cool, wet start to the Canada Day long weekend. But he says if it is sunshine you are after, the forecast should turn in your favour on Saturday.

"It actually looks like Saturday and Sunday will be pretty nice days," points out Kehler. "Saturday things will clear out and we'll see high temperatures in the southeast in the low 20s. Very similar on Sunday, with highs in the low 20s again and no rain expected."

And though Kehler says it will not be a hot long weekend, it should at least be pleasant on Saturday and Sunday. 

As we get to Monday, Kehler says it appears we will see a return to unsettled conditions with another chance of rain on Canada Day. 

"But it's going to be scattered, so it won't be a complete washout," he says. 

Kehler admits that he is not fully certain that Monday will be wet. That is because the rain is not associated with a big weather system, as is the case today. Kehler says he suspects that Monday will have good weather for part of the day, which could turn rainy later on. 

Meanwhile, Kehler says June is typically either the wettest or one of the wettest months of the year. And he says this June has certainly had its fair share of precipitation. Kehler says this is all linked to a really active jet stream across the Prairies as the El Nino that we had throughout the winter begins to decay. He notes this often tends to direct a lot of weather systems onto the Pacific Coast, which then come to the Prairies in the form of both rainfall and severe weather. 

"We've seen a lot of both of those so far this summer," he says. "And it looks like that trend is going to continue as we move into July."

Kehler says what happens some months is that the precipitation comes all at once. He notes you might have only a few wet days, yet you can receive an entire month's worth of rain in those few days. What happens then is that it looks like it was a rainy month, but in fact, most days were beautiful. Kehler says this June seems to be just the opposite, as though there have not been many days with a lot of rain, there have been a lot of days with some rain. In fact, of the 28 days so far this month, 18 of them have had a measurable amount of rain in Steinbach. 

Meanwhile, Kehler says there seems to be an interesting disagreement between the two types of weather models they rely on. He notes their traditional models which they have been using for many years are saying that the weather will turn hotter in mid-July. However, there is a new type of weather model that makes long-range forecasts based on artificial intelligence (AI). These AI models are predicting a cooler middle of July. 

Kehler says when it comes to large-scale weather patterns, AI tends to be as accurate, if not more accurate, than the traditional weather forecast. He notes where AI is not as accurate is when forecasting very specific details such as how much it will rain in Steinbach tomorrow. 

"But if we're looking at the long-range forecast generally, in terms of whether it will be hot or cold, wet or dry, they seem to perform quite well on that front," he admits. "So that's why I'm paying a lot more attention to them when I look at the longer-term part of forecasts."

Rainfall amounts in June in Steinbach over the last 10 years. Rainfall amounts are as of June 27, 2024.