An all new edition of the ABC 33/40 Weather Xtreme video is available in the player below, and on iTunes…
I somehow doubt that any other weather blog in the nation has so many updates between midnight and 6:00 a.m…. thanks to Bill Murray and Jason Simpson for their posts this morning… scroll down and read em.
RIGHT NOW: Sure looks like the large circulation associated with Erin is helping to aid the development of showers and storms over North Alabama this morning. NEXRAD estimates are suggesting around 5 inches of rain in Marion County around Brilliant. Needless to say, we have now made the transformation from a dry, continental airmass to a tropical one loaded with moisture. So, you have to figure more scattered showers and storms will fire up this afternoon during the heat of the day, and if that happens all of those storms will pack a load of lightning, and there will be some potential for wet microbursts. Away from the storms, we will be pretty close to 100 degrees. The moist air will not heat as effectively, but heat index values will be considerably higher.
THE WEEKEND: The weather will stay hot as the 5940 meter heights remain over Alabama at 500 millibars. You have to figure will still be close to 100 tomorrow and Sunday, and we will mention the chance of a few isolated storms around both days, mainly during the afternoon and evening hours.
NEXT WEEK: The GFS really keeps the heat bubble over Alabama for much of next week, and if that model is correct we might have more triple digit days. These heat ridges can be very hard to break down, and it might be onto the correct idea. For now, we will show highs in the mid to upper 90s, with only isolated showers and storms around. No sign of any widespread rain during the first half of next week. Then, of course, toward the end of next week the wildcard is Hurricane Dean.
MEAN DEAN: Scroll down for Bill Murray’s excellent post on Dean for complete details on the current status of the storm. Model madness is the story next week; the European moves Dean almost due west, with landfall way, way south of Brownsville, Texas, while the GFDL brings a more northward component of motion, moving the system as a powerful hurricane in the general direction of Galveston/Sabine Pass. Sometimes a study of hurricane history/climatology can give you a good clue, and it sure would favor the track toward Texas, or maybe even Louisiana.
But, nobody, and I mean nobody knows now the final destination of Dean. The greatest advice I got when I first got into this business was this: “tell them what you know, and don’t tell them what you don’t know”. Trying to call a landfall point right now is like rolling the dice in Las Vegas… just a guess, and nothing more. There will be reasonable skill in a specific forecast by early next week.
The best possible scenario is a landfall along the Louisiana coast well west of New Orleans, where there is little population density. Then, that moisture moves up through Mississippi and into Alabama with a good, widespread, beneficial rain here late next week. But, that is only a wish for now.
WEATHER PARTY: Get all the latest weather news over on our sister site, WeatherParty.com. Be sure and register while you are there; you can submit stories and vote on them to determine what is published on the front page. Many, many excellent articles over there on a wide range of weather topics.
WEATHER BRAINS: Don’t forget you can listen to our weekly 30 minute netcast anytime on the web, or on iTunes. This is the show all about weather hosted by David Black and featuring many familiar voices, including our meteorologists here at ABC 33/40. The deadline has passed for entering our “guess Dean’s landfall” contest…. we have had many entries and it will be fun to see who wins. Listen to the show for more details in case you haven’t heard it yet.
Look for the next Weather Xtreme video here by 3:30 this afternoon….
