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The rain is so near yet so far away. Thanks to Tropical Storm Barry, Southeast Georgia is getting a good soaking which I hope will really help the fire situation there. And that should help the smoke situation here. Unfortunately for Central Alabama, the track of Barry will keep much of the rain well to our east. So while Barry won’t have much impact on the drought situation in Central Alabama, it is helping out to some extent. The future track of Barry will keep it hugging the coastline of the Eastern US bringing some beneficial rain to the coastal area.
For us in Central Alabama we will see the approach of a weak cold front Sunday which might stimulate some showers but they should remain scattered and not provide rain to all locations. But any rain would be welcome. I even got 2 hundredths of an inch yesterday at my house – hardly enough to dampen the dust. Actually, I got a gully washer where I was, but I am in Chicago, so that does not count for the drought in Central Alabama.
The front will hardly bring much change in temperature, but hopefully we’ll get a few showers.
The upper ridge builds strongly over the Southeast at the end of the week, so I expect to see temperatures climb into the lower 90s even as we approach the official start to summer on June 21. And it looks like the upper ridge along with surface high pressure will stay with us into the start of the following week.
In the much longer range, the upper ridge is forecast to breakdown with the development of a trough over the Eastern US. The GFS is also showing a great deal of jitteriness in the tropics. All of this is being said with the caveat that we are way out into voodoo land, so the confidence is not high. I will, however, point out that the GFS did a pretty good job with the development of Barry in giving us the right trends. So we’ll see.
Don’t forgot to drop by the Weather Brains site at www.weatherbrains.com for some interesting discussion on weather topics. I’ll get another weather xtreme video posted Sunday morning by 10-ish. I hope you have a great Saturday. I’m off to explore downtown Chicago including a trip with my daughter to The Royal George Theatre for “Sunday School Cinema” where she is stage manager. And it looks like I will have to avoid some rain later today, too. God bless.
-Brian-
