Tropical moisture streaming into the central Plains from the tropical systems in the East Pacific Ocean will help to fuel severe thunderstorms and downpours across the region this weekend.Drenching rain developed across the Dakotas and northern Minnesota Friday evening and continued into Saturday morning as a storm system began to strengthen over the region.Residents woke up to flooded roadways as over four inches of rain fell in Fargo, North Dakota, Friday night. Radar-estimated rainfall shows similar rainfall totals across much of the area.Fargo, North Dakota normally receives 2.05 inches of rain through the month of September.More showers are expected to develop across North Dakota through Saturday afternoon, while locally severe thunderstorms can produce hail and gusty winds in parts of Minnesota. While the heavy rain is not expected to be as widespread as Friday night, any quick downpour can increase the risk for flash flooding across the rain-soaked area.Farther south, the central Plains will be on alert for severe thunderstorms and rounds of heavy downpours into Sunday.The storm system over the northern Plains will pull tropical moisture from Lorena and Mario, near the western coast of Mexico, into the central Plains. At the same time, the system will bring a cold front into the region.Showers and thunderstorms will continue to develop from southern Iowa and northern Missouri through central Kansas into Saturday evening as the front approaches the warm and humid air over the area."Storms that fire up later Saturday will have the ability to produce flash flooding, hail, damaging wind gusts and there could be an isolated tornado," stated AccuWeather Meteorologist Tyler Roys. The biggest threat for tornadoes will be when storms first develop, but downpours, hail and damaging wind gusts will continue to be a threat into the evening hours."Those who are attending any high school or collegiate sporting events should play heed to all weather warnings and take shelter when told to do so."Motorists traveling on Interstate-35 and Interstate-70 in these areas should be aware of changing weather conditions, decreased visibility in times of heavy rain and ponding on roadways.While the severe storm threat will be gradually diminishing after sunset, showers and storms will continue the risk for flash flooding as they expand from Oklahoma and Kansas into northern Illinois through Saturday night.On Sunday, occasional downpours will once again soak much of the same areas as the cold front will be slow to exit the central Plains. But as tropical moisture is pulled farther north, drenching rain is forecast to spread into Illinois, Iowa and Michigan.Flash flooding will be most common in areas where the front stalls and brings multiple rounds of heavy rain to end the weekend. "This will have the ability to produce widespread rainfall totals of 1-3 inches with the AccuWeather StormMax™ of 6 inches," added Roys.Chicago; Kansas City, Missouri and Oklahoma City are forecast to be in the heavy rain area.Spectators heading the Kansas City Chiefs game on Sunday will need to be aware of possible road closures due to flooding and pack rain gear for the game.A line of locally heavy showers and thunderstorms along the cold front will begin to push south out of the central Plains Sunday night, while the bulk of the tropical moisture fueled rain spreads into parts of the Ohio Valley.The storm system will move toward the Northeast on Monday and drier air will settle into the northern and central Plains for the start of the work week.

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