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Storms really blossomed last night north of Birmingham; rainfall amounts of one to two inches were common from Gardendale and Mount Olive north to near the Smith Lake Dam. But, other parts of Alabama were bone dry. So it goes on a summer evening in Alabama…
I really don’t expect much change this overall pattern through the weekend. Sure, there will be day to day variations on the arrangement of the showers and storms, but we simply don’t have the skill to tell you when and where they will form. Airmass storms on a summer day in Alabama remain one of the great mysteries of the science. The chance of any one spot getting wet today is about one in three, with most of the showers and storms coming between 1:00 and 9:00 p.m. But, with an upper trough around here, extending south of a closer upper low between Pittsburgh and Detroit, we might even see a late night or morning shower in spots. Afternoon temperatures will peak somewhere between 87 and 91 degrees today.
LONG RANGE: The 00Z GFS came in a little hotter for the first part of August, but that seems to be an outlier. The general idea remains that the most intense heat will remain northwest of Alabama for the next 30 days. I still think temperatures will be slightly below normal, with rain a little above normal, on an average basis, for the next two weeks.
PEAK OF THE SUMMER HEAT: Based on averages since weather data has been collected in Birmingham (good data starts in the 1880s here), we are now in the hottest part of a normal summer. The average high is 91, and the average low is 70 from July 13 through August 10. We can be thankful that temperatures this week are running a little below normal because it can be very hot this time of the year. In the summer of 1952, new record highs were reached six days in a row (from July 23 through July 28) with triple digit heat on all of those days. The hottest day was July 25, 1952 when the high in Birmingham was 106 degrees.
WEATHER PARTY: Get all the latest weather news over on our sister site, WeatherParty.com. Be sure and register while you are there; you can submit stories and vote on them to determine what is published on the front page.
WEATHER BRAINS: Don’t forget you can listen to our weekly 30 minute netcast anytime on the web, or on iTunes. This is the show all about weather hosted by David Black and featuring many familiar voices, including our meteorologists here at ABC 33/40. I love the piece this week about Cidadas and Katydids… you never know what we will talk about on this show.
Enjoy the day… I will have the next Weather Xtreme video posted by 3:30 or so this afternoon!
