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No dull days around here anytime soon… we have plenty of issues to discuss…
And, scroll down for J.B.’s excellent travel discussion. Very handy for holiday travelers; tomorrow is the busiest travel day of the year, according to many sources.
RIGHT NOW: Birmingham is at 72 degrees as of 1:00… still looks like we will peak today around 74 or 75, which is over 10 degrees above the average for today (63), and within a few degrees of the record high for November 20 (79 in 1896).
TOMORROW THROUGH THANKSGIVING: Moisture will increase quickly tonight and tomorrow in advance of a strong surface cold front and the associated upper trough. A few showers and storms could break out tomorrow afternoon, but the main band of storms will roll through here late tomorrow night, most likely after midnight. It still looks like the primary window will come from about 12:00 midnight tomorrow night through 8:00 a.m. Thursday. The extraction from the 12Z NAM shows 0.40″ of rain for Birmingham… the GFS is very similar with 0.43″. I still think many spots will get over 1/2 inch.
SPC maintains a slight risk of severe weather in the broad area from Tyler, Texas to Louisville, Kentucky for tomorrow afternoon and tomorrow night. This includes roughly the northern half of Alabama. We do note that surface based CAPE values (instability) are a little higher on the 12Z model runs; the NAM pushes the SBCAPE to 539 j/kg tomorrow night. Still, you really want to see that number over 1,000 for a significant chance of severe weather. There will be a decent amount of shear; the 0 to 3 km helicity values peak at 205.
Bottom line… I think the best chance of rotating storms will come tomorrow evening over North Mississippi and West Tennessee… our primary issue will be a squall line that rolls in here after midnight tomorrow night, and most likely it will be weakening as the air becomes more stable and the best upper support pulls away to the north. But, we will need to watch it as always for any surprises.
The rain will move out of the state Thursday morning, and as the wet weather moves out, much colder air moves in. Still looks like falling temperatures with a gusty and chilly north breeze; we should wind up in the 40s by Thursday afternoon.
FRIDAY: We will be in-between storm systems, so this should be a sunny day for the shoppers, with an early morning temperature near freezing, and a high in the low 50s.
WEEKEND STORM SYSTEM: A strong upper trough will be coming our way for the weekend with more wet and potentially storm weather. Overrunning rain should become widespread during the day Saturday, as moist air rides up and over a shallow layer of colder air near the surface. Saturday night continues to look cold and wet in Auburn for the Iron Bowl, with rain likely and temperatures in the 40s.
The 12Z GFS continues the idea of a surface low moving from near New Orleans to Tupelo Sunday; a warm front will surge northward during the day, and should be north of I-20 by the evening hours. This will put much of Alabama in the warm sector of the storm system, and will bring the risk of a significant outbreak of severe thunderstorms and tornadoes, IF the model is correct. Lets get the mid-week system out of here before we get too carried away on a solution for the weekend.
The weekend system, one way or another, should be very wet; it will bring the potential for widespread two inch rains to Alabama and Georgia. We can be thankful for that.
LONG RANGE: The GFS continues the idea of a very deep, long wave upper trough over the eastern U.S. in the December 1-3 time frame, which could mean very cold air down here and a major snow storm (blizzard, perhaps…) for the Midwest. All voodoo at this point, of course.
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