Live Now


It's not the polar vortex driving down temperatures

Updated: 5:19 PM CDT Jul 15, 2014
img-It s not the polar vortex driving down temperatures
It's not the polar vortex driving down temperatures
Updated: 5:19 PM CDT Jul 15, 2014

Temperatures are expected to be 10 to 20 degrees below normal for the next few days across the state, National Weather Service forecasters said.


The record low temperature in Des Moines is 53 degrees, which is expected to be tied Wednesday morning.

We will see temperatures slowly warm now through the weekend.  By early next week expect highs back in the mid 80s to low 90s across Iowa, NWS forecasters said.

The heat index could be near 100 degrees.


This summer temperature cool down has sparking some chat in social media about the return of the polar vortex.  A similar cool down of 15 to 20 degrees below normal last January led to buzz about the weather term known for decades to meteorologists.

"All of a sudden, the message was, 'Oh, it's polar vortex 6, polar vortex 7, etc….' When in fact there's only one polar vortex and it's there pretty much all the time," said Jim Lee, a National Weather Service meteorologist.

"The polar vortex is loosely defined as kind of a long-standing, large scale pressure system in the upper levels of the atmosphere near the north and south poles," said Lee.

"I would never talk about it on air typically if it hadn't been such a buzzword this year. It's a scientific word so people don't want to, they just want to know what does it mean for me and it means grab your jacket," said KCCI Meteorologist Wes Callison. "People will forget about this by the middle of next week -- we're back in the 90s, we get a couple of thunderstorms, we'll get the humidity back up. It'll be a distant memory."


Algona: 50 degrees
Atlantic: 49 degrees
Ames: 49 degrees
Creston: 50 degrees
Denison: 48 degrees
Des moines: 53 degrees
Estherville: 48 degrees
Fort Dodge: 48 degrees
Iowa Falls: 48 degrees
Knoxville: 52 degrees
Lamoni: 52 degrees
Marshalltown: 48 degrees
Mason City: 48 degrees
Oskaloosa: 50 degrees
Ottumwa: 51 degrees
Waterloo: 49 degrees