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OCCASIONAL SHOWERS: An upper level low continues to spin away near New Orleans this afternoon, and that feature is producing large areas of rain and thunderstorms over the southern third of Alabama, and the Florida panhandle. A rather moist airmass will continue to cover Alabama through Saturday, and our forecast will continue to reflect a chance of scattered showers and storms on a daily basis, with highs mostly in the low to mid 80s.
While the best chance of showers and storms will come during the afternoon and evening hours, we sure can’t rule out some rain late at night, or during the morning with that ULL nearby. The NAM is printing 1.18″ of rain for Birmingham for the next 84 hours; the GFS is drier with 0.51″.
The 12Z GFS is a little slower with the weekend front; it has it near I-20 at midday Sunday. We will continue to mention the chance of showers Sunday morning, but by Sunday afternoon the most widespread rain should shift down into the southern half of the state.
NEXT WEEK: Much cooler air blows in here Sunday night… the high Monday and Tuesday of next week will be close to 80, with lows down in the 50s. There is a chance the cooler valleys could reach the upper 40s by daybreak Tuesday. The week looks rain-free with dry air in place and only a slow increase in heat and humidity.
FOOTBALL WEATHER: The chance of any one high school stadium getting wet tonight and tomorrow night is about one in three, so you might want to take some rain gear just in case. The most widespread rain, most likely, will remain over the southern half of the state. Temperatures will be in the upper 70s at kickoff both tonight and tomorrow night.
TROPICS: Danny is right on track, well south of Cape Hatteras, and is packing sustained winds of 60 mph, and the system is forecast to become a minimal hurricane during the nextr 36 hours. The center of circulation should remain just offshore, brushing the upper Atlantic coast of the U.S. tomorrow night and Saturday with gusty winds, heavy rain at times, and very rough surf. No major damage is expected… just a few cases of downed trees and power lines. However, there could be airport delays at New York City and Boston Saturday due to the inclement weather.
The system out in the far eastern Atlantic is looking more organized on satellite images, and has a chance of becoming Tropical Storm Erika in coming days. Most of the dynamic models keep this one coming west/northwest, and some of the intensity models ramp this up into a category one hurricane in 60 hours. Too early to determine if this one has a chance of entering the Caribbean, or if it will recurve in the Atlantic before reaching the U.S. See the Weather Xtreme video for more details.
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