The Tuesday afternoon ABC 33/40 Weather Xtreme video is available in the player below, and on iTunes:
Temperatures will drop quickly across Alabama tonight with a clear sky and diminishing wind. Most places will wind up somewhere between 24 and 29 degrees by daybreak tomorrow; some of the coldest valleys might even reach the low 20s. The weather will stay dry and cool tomorrow with a high in the low 50s.
WARMING UP AGAIN: A warming trend begins Thursday afternoon as we move into the upper 50s, a few communities in West Alabama might touch the 60 degree mark. Then, a high in the mid 60s is likely Friday as a nice southeast breeze kicks in. Of course, moisture will be increasing, so a few widely scattered showers are not out of the question, but we sure get the idea most of the day Friday will be dry.
THE WEEKEND: A major upper trough will slowly move in our direction, but most of the heavy rain over the weekend will be focused on the general area from near Texarkana, AR to Indianapolis, IN. Here in Alabama, I get the idea most places will be dry on Saturday with afternoon temperatures nearing the 70 degree mark. The main band of rain and storms will finally move in here late Sunday and Sunday night.
NEXT WEEK: Much colder air rolls into the state on Monday of next week with brisk north winds. The GFS MOS has a high of 48 degrees on Monday; that is probably optimistic. We might have a hard time getting out of the 30s with clouds lingering through at least the first half of the day. The cold air settles in here for much of next week, and since we will be on the edge of the Arctic airmass it will be shallow; only a few thousand feet deep.
The 12Z GFS run has come in as dry as a bone for the first half of next week, quite a radical departure from the icy look we have seen in recent days. Forget the run to run differences; you have to look at the pattern, and I still think it favors an overrunning event for parts of the Deep South with an associated ice threat (freezing rain). Where will be greatest threat be and how much ice? No way of knowing now; just be aware of the threat. Most likely, if overrunning does begin the best chance of ice will be closer to I-40 than I-20, but you sure can’t rule out some issues into parts of North Alabama.
LONG RANGE: Cold is the word for much of the nation for the latter half of January. See J.B.’s note below on the Alaska cold; that air won’t sit still. It has to move, and I get the idea we will have several intrusions of bitterly cold air into the continental U.S. in coming weeks. Both the GFS and the ECMWF look cold in the longer ranges. And, with an active southern stream, some winter weather mischief sure looks likely, at least a threat or two. Looks like plenty of fun and games ahead in the weather office, maybe as early as the first half of next week.
WEATHER BRAINS: We had a link to the old WeatherBrains netcast for a while this morning… that has been corrected and the new version is up on the weatherbrains web site and on iTunes. We have a fun show this week… I hope you have some time to listen.
Just picked up a new iMac for the great Alabama weather legend, J.B. Elliott. We are going to see if we can make him a MAC man, like many of us here in the weather office… I will drop by his place and install the new computer tomorrow. I have owned a MacBook Pro since last summer and have learned to love the hardware and operating system. I will have the next Weather Xtreme video posted here by 7:00 a.m. tomorrow… stay warm tonight!
