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Wasn’t the lower humidity yesterday wonderful. I know the afternoon temperatures climbed well into the upper 80s, but with a slight breeze and the drier air, it did not feel too bad outside. And I can attest to that from personal experience since I traveled to Hamilton at the invitation of Matt McCracken, the EMA Director for Marion County, to participate in their Community Awareness event held in the parking lot of the brand new Wal-Mart Supercenter. It was great to see all the wonderful folks from the area who came out to view the emergency services equipment and talk about safety.
Kind of a brisk start to the day today with some spots across North Central and Northeast Alabama dropping into the upper 50s. This is the coolest day of July for low temperatures. At Birmingham, you’ve got to go back to June 21 to see a morning as cool as this one or back to May 22 to see one with a low in the upper 50s. Refreshing for July – verey refreshing.
We can expect to enjoy the lower humidity for at least one more day before moisture begins climbing back into the more humid range. A small surface feature called an inverted trough could bring some isolated storms to the Southeast portion of the state today, but moisture which often comes from the Atlantic with inverted troughs remained very limited. The result will be only isolated showers down that way.
Monday as moisture levels climb we should begin to see scattered showers return to North and Central Alabama. The trough along the east coast today will retrograde or move westward as the low center actually meanders for much of this week. It will get a little stronger and then weaken as it moves into Western Pennsylvania and then Ohio and finally the Carolinas by Friday. The trough axis will be in the vicinity of Alabama for the next several days, but gradually works its way to our east. This is not the most favorable position to bring us the best chances for rain, but by the end of the week, we should see some weak disturbances in the northwesterly flow that will help shower chances.
The really good news, even into voodoo land, is that there appears to be no sign of any really significant heat.
The trough gradually weakens and pulls off to the north-northeast by next Sunday, but it leaves a broad weakness in the 500 millibar pattern which should continue to provide better chances for afternoon and evening showers.
Well into the long range, a more typical summer-time pattern returns as the westerlies retreat to the US-Canadian border with a broad ridge over the southern tier of the US. With moisture levels remaining high, though, scattered showers will remain a good possibility.
Tropics remain quiet though an area of lowered pressure was being watched from Eastern Cuba across the Southeast Bahamas and into the Atlantic. Conditions are not really good for any development, but may become a bit more favorable over the next couple of days.
James Spann will be back with the next Weather Xtreme Video bright and early tomorrow morning. I hope that you have a great Sunday. God bless.
-Brian-
