Big changes lie ahead. Summerlike warmth and humidity return in coming days.
Readings are headed to 80 degrees Thursday for the first time in 10 days and are likely
to flirt with 80 degrees Friday and Saturday. A multiday 80-degree spell isn't unusual
this time of year. Weather records put odds of back to back 80s beyond this date at 97
percent.
The higher temperatures return with surging humidities -- a set-up which threatens a
new round of heavy rains Friday night into Saturday. More rain involving the remnants
of Hurricane Ike could hit late in the weekend.
RECENT NIGHTS AMONG COOLEST IN EARLY SEPTEMBER SINCE 1997
Warmth has been a no-show of late. Until the recent chill, it's been 11 years since two
consecutive early September Chicago mornings have recorded low temps in the 40s.
Daybreak lows dipped as low as 43 degrees early Tuesday just west of Aurora and in
Rockford. But it was Ogle County's Rochelle -- west of De Kalb -- which logged the
area's chilliest reading of 37 degrees. Weather history suggests the first freezing
temperatures at O'Hare, if this proves a typical meteorological autumn, are still more
than month away.
--Tom Skilling, Chief Meteorologist, WGN-TV/Chicago Tribune
