Stubborn "Cut-Off" Low

What a gloomy past 5 days it's been around the Northern Plains/Great Lakes region. The culprit...something those in the weather world call a "cut-off low". A cut-off low is an area of low pressure that is removed from the main jet stream. Usually systems move along the jet stream, and are here and gone within a day or so. On occasion, areas of low pressure become removed from the main jet, therefore stalling out until a front comes through and pushes it along. This has been the case with this low, which really started affecting our weather since last Thursday. Below is an image of where the low is, and where the main jet currently is (way up in Canada).



It does look like, however, that some relief is finally on the way as a trough/cold front looks to sweep across the area, and will therefore push the low off to the east. It is still a good 48 hours away, so we are probably going to have to deal with the clouds and gloom through the day Tuesday, and likely even most of the day Wednesday before the clouds break. Below is an image of where the low is forecast to be, with the blue lines showing the trough that will push the low off to the east.



That trough will also deliver a shot of cooler air, with the European model being more aggressive than the American models, but it will certainly look and feel like fall. We will warm back up though, with the CPC predicting above average temps in their 6-10 day outlook.

Can wildfires enhance instability for thunderstorms?

Recently in my boredom, I thought I would take a peak at the visible satellite loop in northern Minnesota to see if the smoke could still be seen. Looking at the loop a couple times, I did spot the smoke, but there was something else that I noticed as well. It looked like thunderstorms were developing right over where the smoke was. At first, I thought it was a weird coincidence, but after watching the loop a few more times, it looked like the clouds kept billowing and storms kept developing over that same spot. At that point I thought to myself, can the heat from wildfires actually provide extra instability to the atmosphere to help with thunderstorm development? I know I've seen mini tornadoes in the fire of wildfires, but wasn't sure if it went beyond that or not. So, I'm interested in any input from people on their thoughts. Did the fires assist in thunderstorm development, or was this just a mere coincidence. Below are some stills I got of the visible satellite images.