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Cindy Bringing Heavy Rain, Severe Weather to Alabama, But Leaves a Nice Present Next Week

| June 22, 2017 @ 8:47 am

Lots of wrecks out there across the area this morning with all the rain. Take it easy, take your time and leave early. Watch out for the other guy. It’s not a normal day.

It is one of my favorite days, however, with a weakening, post landfall tropical cyclone recurving toward me rain and and slightly breezy conditions. I track it back to 1971’s Hurricane Edith, which moved across Alabama from the southwest as a dying tropical cyclone on the 16th and 17th of September. Edith had been the most powerful hurricane of that year, striking northeastern Nicaragua as a category 5 hurricane a few days earlier. It impacted Central American, then brushed northeastern Mexico before turning back to the northeast and moving over us. I actually got to miss school those two days so I could track it.

The center of Tropical Storm Cindy made landfall around 2 a.m. CDT last night near Cameron, Louisiana. It will weaken and track north and then northeast over the next two days, keeping Alabama in a favorable position for rain and storms, and possible tornadoes.

A tornado watch is in effect for the southwestern third of Alabama. The counties included come up as far as Sumter, Greene, Hale, Perry, Autuaga and Montgomery. Everything south of that is in the watch. The watch is in effect until 1 p.m.

Two feeder bands are set up across Alabama at this time. The first is the impressive one that formed and moved up out of the Gulf of Mexico during the afternoon. That band rotated slowly northward overnight, dumping 1-2 inches of rain on a large area.

Here are storm total rainfall amounts as estimated by Doppler radar so far:

As you can see, a large area has gotten at least two inches of rain. The radar image jives well with my total here off Acton Road, which is 1.62 inches. 1.90 in the past 24 hours at the Birmingham Airport. Their storm total is 2.05 inches.

Flash flood warnings remain in effect for several counties in Southwest and South Alabama and Southeast Mississippi. You can see the edge of the Flash Flood Warnings for Choctaw and Lowndes Counties on the storm total graphic.

A flood advisory was just issued for Pickens, Marengo Greene, Hale and Sumter Counties which will experience a feeder band that is moving north northeast over the next couple of hours.

No severe thunderstorm or tornado warning are in effect across Alabama at this time. But as we get more heating during the day, instabilities will rise and small low topped supercells will develop in and in between the feeder bands that are capable of producing small spin up tornadoes like the ones we saw yesterday. They won’t last long but they can produce quick hitting tornadoes, even where there isn’t any lightning.

Be able to get warnings immediately and go to safe shelter if you receive one for your location.

One such band is working its way into Southwest and West Central Alabama at this time. We will be watching it and the cells developing just ahead of it as they bring heavy rain, the threat of more flooding and the threat of those tornadoes in the next few hours. We will deal with them throughout the day, but it looks like things will be fairly calm tonight although I have to believe there will still be showers.

By Friday morning, the remnants of Cindy will be near Memphis. Showers and storms will start developing around noon and a line of strong to severe storms will move across during the afternoon. More rain and storms will move into Alabama Friday night as a cold front rides Cindy’s coattails into the Southeast. Rain will continue into Central Alabama on Saturday.

How about dewpoints in the 50s Sunday, Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday? We will think we died and went to heaven! Thanks Cindy!

Category: Alabama's Weather, ALL POSTS

About the Author ()

Bill Murray is the President of The Weather Factory. He is the site's official weather historian and a weekend forecaster. He also anchors the site's severe weather coverage. Bill Murray is the proud holder of National Weather Association Digital Seal #0001 @wxhistorian

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