2011 Starting Loudly

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Many people in Central Alabama were waking to the sound of thunder this morning as thunderstorms rumbled across sections of the state. Along with the thunder there were large amounts of rainfall to go with that thunder producing flash flood warnings for a number of counties across the northern half of the state. At this writing, all severe thunderstorm warnings had expired, there were no tornado warnings in effect, but a tornado watch continued until 10 am for a large section of Alabama – that is Tornado Watch Number 2 for 2011.

2010 ended on a violent note with at least three weather related deaths – possibly as many as six – according to news reports and those at the SPC. Main severe weather areas were Missouri, Arkansas, and Mississippi. I’m certain we’ll be getting more information on those events today.

For now, though, the severe weather threat has diminished. SPC does have a slight risk forecast for the southern half of Alabama for today where the primary threat will be damaging wind.

The front should move steadily through the state today with rain ending from the west/northwest during the day. Rain could linger for the Southeast sections of the state into early Sunday. So Sunday should see improving conditions with sunshine returning but colder temperatures as the cold air filters into the area. It will not be extreme but Sunday and Monday are likely to see freezing values in the morning with highs only reaching barely into the 50s.

The upper flow goes nearly zonal to a bit southwesterly. This means little change in temperature with the really cold air holding off to our north. However, the upper flow is likely to pickup Pacific moisture so we could be see some clouds off and on for the coming week. The next rain chance could come on Wednesday but it will be scattered at best with the absence of any strong mechanism to force a rain event. The rest of the week looks basically dry until the weekend then an interesting pattern begins to take shape. It looks like the short wave that gets cut off from the rest of the flow comes out of the Southwest US. As it does we could see a surface low in the Gulf. Right now the GFS suggests that all of the precipitation will stay along the Gulf Coast, but colder air does get into this area. So we’ll need to keep a wary eye on this situation to see how it plays out.

The big trend to note in voodoo country is the continued pattern of a trough over the Central and Eastern US. While not especially deep, it does keep a chill in place for the eastern half of the nation.

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The next Weather Xtreme Video should be posted by 7:30 or so on Sunday morning. I hope you have a good day and Godspeed.

-Brian-

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Category: Alabama's Weather