For the remainder of the week, extreme heat will remain focused across the south-central U.S., with only slight expansion eastward into the Mississippi Delta.  The Midwest should experience mostly near- or below-normal temperatures, except for somewhat hotter conditions in the southwestern Corn Belt.  However, much of the northern and eastern Corn Belt will receive little or no rain during the next 5 days, with significant precipitation (locally 1 to 3 inches or more) oriented in a northwest-to-southeast band stretching from the middle Mississippi Valley into the southern Appalachians. 

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