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RIGHT NOW: After a sunny start, clouds have thickened rapidly across Alabama during the midday hours, and light rain is falling over the southern quarter of the state. Our forecast high today was 60; that won’t be happening as temperatures are closer to 50 across the northern counties of Alabama.
A GOOD SOAKING: Rain will become widespread tonight as the surface low in the Gulf of Mexico deepens and moves inland near the Mississippi coast. The low will move to a point near Huntsville by midday tomorrow. For the northern half of Alabama, it looks like the most widespread and heaviest rain will fall from about 9:00 tonight through 9:00 tomorrow morning. With cool, stable air in place, there is no significant threat of severe weather around here, although a little elevated thunder is possible. If any part of our TV coverage area has any severe weather, it would be the far eastern part; counties like Randolph, Chambers, and Tallapoosa. And, that threat seems marginal with hardly any surface based instability.
HOW MUCH? The 12Z NAM has gotten very aggressive and shows 3.47″ for Birmingham… the GFS is printing 1.18″ and we believe is a little closer to the truth. For the I-20 corridor, we will forecast 1 to 2 inches of rain, with isolated amounts to 3 inches. The heaviest rain across the state will be south of a line from Mobile to Montgomery to Roanoke, where come communities could see 5 inches of rain during the next 24 hours. A flash flood watch remains in effect for that part of Alabama, and SPC maintains a slight risk of severe weather for this region as well late tonight into tomorrow morning. The highest severe weather probabilities are over North Florida and the Atlantic Coast of Georgia and South Carolina.
COLDER DAYS: As the rain tapers off late tomorrow, much colder air arrives on Thursday and Friday. The GFS MOS seems way too warm; I don’t think we get out of the 40s both days with lingering clouds and a chilly north wind.
SNOW FLAKES? Remember, we need to get the wave tomorrow out of here before we can really focus on the setup for Friday night and early Saturday. Watch the Weather Xtreme video for details; the 12Z GFS has backed off on the amount of moisture, and suggests nothing more than flurries, which is what we have in our forecast for Friday night. The Canadian GEM is very dry, with all of the moisture we well to the south, but the NAM seems as though it could come in with the deepest moisture (the NAM runs out to only 84 hours). We will stick with just a mention of flurries and adjust things later if needed.
THE WEEKEND: Dry weather is the story Saturday and Sunday with a slow moderating trend; temperatures will recover into the 50s Sunday afternoon.
NEXT WEEK AND BEYOND: The next wave seems set to bring more rain to Alabama Monday of next week; a stronger system shows up around the middle of the week with a good soaking by Wednesday (December 9). Again, watch the Weather Xtreme video for details.
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 featuring many familiar voices, including our meteorologists here at ABC 33/40. You can even listen here on the blog; look for the player on the top left. Scroll down for the notes on this week’s new episode.
I had a great time this morning visiting with the 3rd graders at Cherokee Bend Elementary in Mountain Brook… be looking for them on the Pepsi KIDCAM today at 5:00 on ABC 33/40 News! I will crank out the next Weather Xtreme video by 7:00 a.m. tomorrow… we will have updates, of course, on weather changes frequently between now and then.
