Storms fired late this afternoon from North Central Alabama down through West Central Alabama and into eastern Mississippi along a surface trough. Drawing on high levels of instability, the storms became quite strong to even severe, especially along outflow boundaries and where storms collided.
They continue tonight from northeastern Jefferson County through western Jefferson, southern Walker, northern Tuscaloosa into Pickens and northern Sumter Counties. The strongest storm was east of Aliceville. The storms from Gardendale up to Pinson have blown up in the past 15 minutes and are quite strong with lots of lightning.
Storms were also firing quickly along the Jefferson/Walker County line west of Warrior and in southern Cullman County west of The Colony.
Cells were forming over downtown Birmingham as well. These could produce lightning soon.
Everything should go slowly downhill over the next couple of hours as the instability wanes.
