Sunny but a Little Cooler Today

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A few clouds marked the passage of a cold front through Alabama overnight, but the sky was clearing as an upper trough was moving quickly by. Fortunately, the really colder air will be staying well north and northeast of us, so we’ll only see temperatures fall back a little with highs today in the upper 50s. Those lower 60s yesterday sure felt good!

The upper air flow pattern goes nearly zonal Monday and Tuesday as we await the next short wave that will be digging into the long wave trough position on Wednesday. This will once again bring a cool down to Central Alabama as a series of impulses will move through the long wave trough gradually reducing temperatures until the colder air arrives on Thursday and Friday when highs will struggle to get out of the 40s. Looks like the upper 40s for highs on Thursday and maybe even colder for Friday.

The forecast becomes problematic for Central Alabama on Thursday and Friday. With a strong short wave coming out of Texas Thursday and into Friday, a surface low will form along the Gulf Coast and move off the Southeast US coast by Friday afternoon. With the overnight lows Thursday night into Friday morning in the 30s, we might see a mixture of rain, sleet, and snow as the precipitation starts during the overnight hours along and north of the I-20 corridor. While I fully expect surface temperatures to be above freezing, cold air aloft could support an initial mixture of precipitation. At this time, I do not expect this to cause any major issues, however, should temperatures be only a few degrees colder, the situation would change. Also, there continue to be differences in the various models, so we’ll have to watch carefully on how future model runs handle this situation.

We should warm up a little on Saturday and Sunday as the upper flow goes nearly zonal for the Southeast US with the colder air to our north and northeast.

Voodoo country continues to show an active pattern with a fairly low latitude short wave around the 29th of January that promises some wet weather. That event is followed quickly by a major short wave trough moving through the Central US that could bring thunderstorms and a round of winter weather to the Southeast US. This is much too far out for a specific forecast, but something we’ll surely want to keep an eye on in future model runs.

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I hope you enjoy the day. James Spann will have the next Weather Xtreme Video first thing on Monday morning. Godspeed.

-Brian-

Category: Alabama's Weather