Severe Storms Wednesday??

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COLD MORNING: Pretty brisk out there this morning… Vic Bell up in Northeast Etowah County reports 26 degrees with a big frost; Birmingham is reporting 32 degrees with a north wind at 5 mph, and a wind chill index of 27. We will enjoy a sunny and cool day with a high in the mid 50s.

Tomorrow will also be dry, with a partly sunny sky along with a high in the low 60s. Moisture will begin to increase, but showers will stay west of Alabama.

ACTIVE DAY WEDNESDAY: SPC has all of Alabama in a slight risk of severe weather Wednesday, and watch the Weather Xtreme video to see that 30 percent area over the southern two-thirds of the state. At this stage of the game, there are more questions than answers about the severe weather potential. We do note 200 mb wind speeds of over 130 knots, so jet stream dynamics will be pretty impressive. The 00Z NAM brings surface based CAPE values to over 600 j/kg at Birmingham, with 0 to 3 km helicity values over 400 m2/s2. At first glance, seems like the instability and shear might be a tad out of phase, much like the event last week, but we really won’t know that until Wednesday morning. No doubt we will need to mention strong to severe storms, and we can deal with the specifics as the event gets closer. The best chance of severe weather will be in the 12:00 noon to 12:00 midnight time frame. Rain amounts of over one inch seem likely; this event should be more effective at generating rain that last week’s storm system that was responsible for rain totals of 1/4 inch or less for most places.

TURNING COLDER: A sharp change to colder weather will follow the mid-week storm system. Looks like windy and cold day Thursday with a high only in the low to mid 40s, with a hard freeze by Thursday night and Friday morning, with a low around 20, and colder valleys down in the teens. Friday and the weekend will be cold and dry with temperatures remaining below average for mid-February. A clipper type system will move through Saturday, but at this point we don’t expect any significant precipitation. A fresh supply of colder air arrives Sunday.

VOODOO LAND: Still looks like changeable weather through late February and early March as we approach the beginning of the spring tornado season. Not much model consistency, but expect a little of everything in weeks ahead.

STORM ALERT 2009: This week our annual severe weather awareness show comes to Calhoun County; we will be at the Oxford Civic Center at 7:00. We hope you can join us….

WEATHER BRAINS: Don’t forget you can listen to our weekly 30 minute netcast anytime on the web, or on iTunes. This is the show all about weather featuring many familiar voices, including our meteorologists here at ABC 33/40. You can even listen here on the blog; look for the player on the top left. Tonight, Doug Gillham of Mississippi State will be our guest as he talks about forecast work-flow. A very interesting show… it will be posted by 10:30 or so.

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I will be speaking down at the University of Montevallo today… the afternoon edition of the Weather Xtreme video should be posted by 3:30 or so. Enjoy the day!

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