Hello everyone, Jared Smith here with your Charleston weather forecast for Monday, August 21st, 2023, as well as a look at the week ahead.

High pressure will be the dominant feature across much of the continental United States this week.

As far as we’re concerned in the low country, it’ll keep the forecast mostly dry and still warmer than normal for mid to late August.

Monday looks to continue a string of days starting in the mid 70s and topping out in the low 90s in the afternoon, with heat indices running about 100 to 102.

Unlike the weekend though, capping aloft should keep a lid on any shower or thunderstorm activity that tries to fire.

We repeat this on Tuesday, with air temperatures reaching a little higher into the mid 90s.

This should drive heat indices towards 105 degrees on Tuesday afternoon, below the post-July first heat advisory threshold of 110 degrees for two hours, but still plenty toasty and with an elevated risk of heat stroke.

A front approaches the area midweek and brings a slight shower and thunderstorm chance to the area on Wednesday.

However, most of us should remain rain free as the ridge aloft keeps the atmosphere fairly well capped.

This front will act to cool things off a touch heading into Thursday and Friday, with highs around 90 Thursday and 92 on Friday.

Heat indices will generally stay around 100 or below, especially if dew points can mix out to the upper 60s in the afternoons.

Shower and storm chances return to the area on Saturday, and especially on Sunday as another front approaches us, with temperatures in the 90s continuing for the weekend.

Finally, look at the tropics and boy oh boy did that escalate quickly.

We have three tropical cyclones now in the Atlantic.

Tropical Depression 6, Tropical Storm Emily, and Tropical Storm Franklin, the latter two of which were just named on Sunday.

Six is of no concern and should fall apart pretty much any time, while Emily is going to recurve into the central Atlantic well away from any land areas, as it transitions to a post-tropical cyclone by midweek.

Finally, Tropical Storm Franklin is a concern for Hispaniola, and Tropical Storm watches are out there.

It’s expected to bring some very heavy rain and flash flooding concerns to the island over the next couple days.

It’ll then recurve northeastward, perhaps strengthening into a hurricane as it does so, but it should be moving away from us at that point.

There are two other areas the hurricane center is keeping an eye on in the Atlantic for possible development.

One of them is south of the Cabo Verde Islands, where an area of disturbed weather has a 70% chance of becoming a tropical cyclone in the next week, as it more or less follows in Emily’s footsteps.

The other area to watch is in the Gulf of Mexico, which has a 70% chance of developing into a tropical cyclone of some kind before reaching south Texas and Mexico in the next few days.

The Gulf is bathwater, and it won’t take too much to get something going in there, so that’ll be one for the folks in Corpus Christi and Brownsville to keep a close eye on.

Thankfully, though, there are no current threats to the Lowcountry.

As this weekend has shown, though, things can turn on a dime this time of year.

Climatological peak of hurricane season is September 10th.

So the best thing you can do right now is stay alert and prepared.

And that was Charleston Weather Daily for August 21st, 2023.

I’m Jared Smith.

You can find Charleston weather forecasts online at chswx.com, on Twitter, Instagram and Facebook at chswx, and on Mastodon at chswx at chswx.social.

Speaking of Mastodon, you can now get an automated feed of Charleston weather alerts by following at alerts at chswx.social, with more platforms coming soon.

Thanks for listening, and I’ll talk to you tomorrow.