Author Archives: murray
May 30, 1948: The Vanport City Flood
On May 30, 1948, the Columbia River reclaimed the important war industry city of Vanport, Oregon, destroying ten thousand homes and leaving nineteen thousand people homeless. A total of twenty five people perished in the flood, which gave no warning before inundating the town. Continue reading
Turn Around, Don’t Drown!
Numerous thunderstorms have developed this afternoon from the Jacksonville and Oxford areas in Calhoun County down to Ashland in Clay County to Alexander City in Tallapoosa County to Wetumpka. They are especially widespread between Wetumpka and Montgomery, Auburn and Valley. … Continue reading
Flooding in Birmingham
Some areas in Birmingham are reporting flooding from this afternoon’s heavy thunderstorm that dumped as much as 1.5 to 2 inches of rain in just one hour according to Doppler radar estimates. The heaviest rain fell in the Hoover/Vestavia areas … Continue reading
Wet Afternoon Shaping Up For Birmingham Metro
A warm, moist and unstable airmass covers Central Alabama early this afternoon and thunderstorms have been developing near a surface trough as morning sunshine pushed the mercury to the point that convection could occur. The storms are not severe. There … Continue reading
Showers and Storms Firing Up
Showers and storms are starting to fire in an area of surface convergence generally along and just south of I-20 that is associated with a weak surface trough. All morning, we have been tracking showers and storms in a large … Continue reading
Rain, Storms Lifting Northeast
It is nice to see our old friend SimuAWIPS working again. It is a go to site for me for rapid analysis of the state of the atmosphere. Here is the SimuAWIPS depiction of the radar across the Southeast in … Continue reading
Scary Clouds
They are just that. Scary clouds. Several people around The Summit have been observing menacing looking funnel like clouds to the south over Double Oak Mountain. Here is an example from @jmdrennen. These are harmless scud clouds developing as air … Continue reading
Birmingham Metro Storms Packing a Punch
The storms moving into the Birmingham Metro area right now are strong, with torrential rains, deadly lightning, gusty winds and even some small hail possible. There was a severe thunderstorm warning for Shelby, Bibb and Chilton Counties, but it has … Continue reading
Forecast for Today’s Rickwood Classic: Fun!
Today is my favorite baseball day of the year! It is the day that one of the best sporting events of the year in all of world occurs. An event that ESPN says is one of the 100 Things That … Continue reading
Line of Storms Moving East, Not Severe
Our line of showers and storms has been fairly well behaved this morning. There was one severe thunderstorm warning for Jackson MS overnight, with some tree and power line damage reported there, but the line continued to slowly weaken as … Continue reading
