Brief Update As We Approach The 5 O’Clock Hour

At 4:50 pm, a ragged mass of showers and thunderstorms are stretching from the northwestern parts of North Alabama to the southeastern part of Central Alabama. The stronger storms have been confined to the southern half of the area. There is plenty of cloud-to-ground lightning occurring with the possibility of some gusty winds and small hail on the southern part of that mass, especially south of Brent to Jemison to Alexander City. All of this activity is moving to the northeast.

It looks like NWS Birmingham has nailed the severe weather threat for today as all of the stronger to severe action has taken place south of a line from Geiger to Alabaster to Ranburne. The strongest storm so far today has been the severe thunderstorm that moved through Elmore County dropping large hail and causing damage including trees falling on a few homes in the city of Elmore. The risk areas continue to be south of a line from Geiger to Alabaster to Ranburne through the southern parts of Central Alabama.

Locations south of a line from Linden to Eclectic to Five Points are in a Slight Risk through the rest of the evening. North of that to a line from Geiger to Alabaster to Ranburne are in a Marginal Risk for severe storms. Main threats continue to be from damaging winds of up to 60-70 MPH and hail up to one inch in diameter (quarter size). There is a very small possibility of an isolated tornado, but the threat is nearly so low that it is almost not worth mentioning. With that being said, this is Central Alabama in the middle of the Spring Severe Weather Season, so we have to expect the unexpected.

All of the stronger activity will be out of the area just at or a little before 9:00 pm tonight, but we’ll continue to have lingering scattered showers and storms mainly over the northern half of the area throughout the overnight and into the early morning hours on Sunday.

Category: Alabama's Weather, ALL POSTS, Severe Weather