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A very nice, non-severe band of rain and storms has been moving through North and West Alabama during the pre-dawn hours, providing beneficial rain to some communities. A quick glance at some rain totals since midnight:
Hueytown (Skywatcher) 1.18″
Birmingham (SKYCAM – Daniel Building) 0.79″
Jasper (SKYCAM – King Building) 0.75″
Cullman (SKYCAM) 0.69″
Tuscaloosa (SKYCAM) 0.51″
I am sure J.B. will print a long list here later today. The batch of rain and storms will continue to push into East Alabama during the new few hours.
A tornado watch continues over the southwest part of Alabama this morning, but severe weather reports down there have been few and far between.
REST OF TODAY: We note the actual cold front/dry line is still back to the west, close to I-55 from Jackson to Memphis. There is a decent chance a new (probably very narrow) line of showers and storms could form along this boundary later this morning as it moves into West Alabama. I would say at this point it is doubtful that will offer a big severe weather threat unless the sun breaks out for several hours this morning. The best chance of severe weather later today would seem to be over East and South Alabama, where the air will be most unstable this afternoon. We will keep an eye on it; SPC maintains a slight risk of severe weather over much of Alabama just in case those new storms go encounter some unstable air.
The sky will be mostly clear tonight, and tomorrow will be a dry, pleasant day with ample sunshine and a high in the mid 70s.
SATURDAY: The GFS is really psycho on this next impulse Saturday. After losing it on all runs yesterday, it is back on the 00Z run with a vengeance. It shows a strong vorticity maxiumum rotating through North Alabama Saturday afternoon with a chance of showers, mainly for areas north of I-20. If this shows up again on the 12Z run, we will have to consider sticking in some small risk of a shower back in the forecast for Saturday afternoon, but the moisture levels will be very limited and it should not be a really big deal.
SUNDAY AND BEYOND: This will be a beautiful day with lots of sunshine and a high in the upper 70s. The GFS shows no rain for the first half of next week with highs in the low 80s. Quite frankly, it was very hard finding any big rain event on the GFS all the way into mid-May; consistency has been horrible in the long range making for low confidence on any kind of solution.
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We will keep a close eye on developments today… so stay tuned for frequent updates here on the blog. I will have the next Weather Xtreme video posted by 3:30 this afternoon… enjoy the rain!
