Gorgeous Easter Sunday

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As Ryan Stinnett noted in the forecast this morning, you could not order a better day than what we expect to see across Central Alabama today. Sunshine will be in full supply and we expect the afternoon highs to climb into the middle and upper 70s with comfortably low humidity to add to the wonderful conditions.

Monday will be a transition day as we see clouds increase ahead of the next front approaching the area from the northwest. That front should move into and across Central Alabama Tuesday bringing us showers and perhaps a little thunder. Moisture appears to be somewhat limited, so while the likelihood of showers is very high, the scattered nature of them will mean that some folks won’t get wet at all and some could see a half inch of rain. The surface and upper level low that moved off the Southeast US coast yesterday will help to keep a strong southerly return flow from developing thus limiting the amount of moisture available. But moisture will be sufficient for scattered showers as precipitable water values climb close to 1.5 inches.

Cool 500 millibar temperatures on Tuesday could help to produce thunderstorms with hail. Instability values are somewhat marginal for really strong updrafts, so I do not expect to see any organized severe weather.

The upper trough moves quickly east allowing an upper ridge to build into the eastern third of the country. This will dry us out for Wednesday and Thursday. But while the air mass will be drier, we won’t see any appreciable lowering of the temperatures with a limited northwesterly flow that does not go very far north, so no real air mass change.

The big forecast problem will be dealing with the end of the week and into the weekend. The GFS keeps the ridge fairly strong so that the traveling weather systems are expected to remain well north of us. That puts us into a weakened pattern where the fronts will drag into the area with sufficient moisture for scattered showers driven primarily by daytime heating. While the best chance for showers appears to come on Friday, the front becomes stationary in the area keeping us susceptible to scattered showers into the weekend. Without a strong push, the front is not likely to bring much in the way of an air mass change so temperatures will remain warm with highs around 80 or so.

Looking out into voodoo country, the GFS had a really strong Omega ridge developing at the end of April. While the pattern remains similar, the latest GFS run is more realistic in the look of the ridge. A strong upper trough approaches the eastern US on May 1, which could signal a round of severe storms for the Southeast US. By May 5th, the GFS shows the westerlies well north of us putting us into the same issue of fronts dragging into the area without much strength.

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Thanks for staying tuned to the Weather Xtreme Video. I’ll be handling the weather duties on ABC 3340 at 5 and 10 pm today, so catch the latest news and weather forecast then. James Spann will be back with the next video first thing Monday morning. Happy Easter and Godspeed.

-Brian-

Category: Alabama's Weather