(Photo taken by KIWA Staff)
Sioux Falls, SD — The official weather radar that serves our area is going to be down for a bit.
National Weather Service officials tell us the Sioux Falls Doppler radar will be offline for up to one week beginning Wednesday, June 24th, for the replacement of the radar dome panels and repainting. This outage cannot be postponed for severe weather, and the radar can’t be returned to service until work is completed.
They tell us that during the downtime, adjacent radars include those in Des Moines, IA, Aberdeen, SD, Rapid City, SD, Omaha, NE, Chanhassen, MN, and North Platte, NE. For direct access to any of these surrounding radar sites, you can visit http://radar.weather.gov/
The replacement of panels and the painting of the radome are part of a national maintenance program designed to extend the life of the National Weather Service radar network.
Weather Service officials in Sioux Falls tell us that the dates for these repairs are determined by the national contractor rather than the local office. Additionally, these repairs must be scheduled outside of the winter months to ensure they can be completed successfully.
Our next chance for showers and thunderstorms starts Saturday night, and then we’ll have off-and-on chances through Monday night, according to Weather Service officials. At last report, severe weather risks for our area for the next week remained low.
