An all new edition of the ABC 33/40 Weather Xtreme video is available in the player below, and on iTunes…
Be sure and scroll down to read all of the blog posts today concerning Hurricane Dean and other items. During active tropical weather, blog traffic gets pretty intense, but all of the information is excellent. J.B. Elliott is the great Alabama weather legend.
RIGHT NOW: A quick peek at some 2:00 temperatures this afternoon:
Montgomery 101
Auburn 99
Anniston 97
Gadsden 97
Muscle Shoals 97
Tuscaloosa 96
Birmingham 95
Radar is showing absolutely nothing, so our long dry spell continues. The rain deficit at Birmingham is now up to 20.18″, and it will only grow larger through mid-week.
LOOKING AHEAD: Still hot and dry tomorrow and Thursday with lots of sunshine. The high will be close to 100 degrees on both days, almost ten degrees above normal for late August in Alabama.
The upper air ridge still shows signs of breaking down a bit by Friday and the weekend, and accordingly we will bring back the chance of widely scattered afternoon showers and storms, and also drop the afternoon highs a bit. That looks like the story for much of next week as well; daily highs in the 91 to 95 degree range with a few spots catching a cool afternoon storm on a daily basis.
TROPICS: Dean is moving over the Bay of Campeche right now, and will move into the Mexican Gulf coast for the final landfall within 24 hours. The big problem with Dean over inland Mexico will be potential for flash flooding.
The next system, the Felix wanna-be, is still rather disorganized east of the Bahamas. While the Canadian model has lost it, the NAM is holding strong, bringing it to the southern part of Florida over the weekend. We will keep an eye on it.
LONG RANGE: The 12Z run of the GFS is advertising a nice long wave upper trough over the eastern U.S. on August 31; this would mean a decent chance of rain followed by cooler temperatures (mainly at night!). Sure sounds nice, but this is still voodoo at this point. I do believe that this will be the final week of intense heat across Alabama until the summer of 2008.
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.
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. You can see the show notes for the new episode here on the blog earlier today.
I had a great time this morning speaking to the senior adults at the Bibb Medical Center in Centreville, down in Bibb County. Look for the next Weather Xtreme video here by 7:00 a.m. tomorrow!
