Delta’s Clouds Keeping Some of Us from Enjoying a Good Bit of Sunshine at Midday

CONDITIONS JUST BEFORE MIDDAY

As of 11:10 am, radar is free from any shower activity across Central Alabama at the moment. All we have on there is some false returns over the eastern parts of the area, as other radar sites do not show those same false returns. Skies are ranging from mostly clear to mostly cloudy across the area thanks to the northern parts of Hurricane Delta’s cloud deck. Temperatures are in the lower 70s to the lower 80s across the area as of the 11:00 am official roundup. Gadsden was the cool spot at 71 degrees with partly sunny skies. Montgomery and Troy were tied as the warm spots at 83 degrees with mostly sunny skies. Birmingham was at 79 degrees with partly sunny skies.

RAIN CHANCES BEGIN TO INCREASE LATE TODAY

As some tropical moisture begins to work northward up from the outer edge of Delta, rain chances will begin to rise slowly throughout the remainder of the day. Isolated to scattered showers will be possible along and south of a line from Demopolis to Montgomery to Eufaula throughout the afternoon and early evening hours, roughly around 20-30%. Those same rain chances will exist for the extreme western parts of the area along with the extreme southern parts during the late-night and overnight hours. The rest of Central Alabama will stay dry at least until after sunrise on Friday. Skies will remain partly to mostly cloudy for a while, but clouds will increase later tonight. Highs will be in the mid to upper 80s across the area with overnight lows in the lower 60s to the lower 70s.

SHOWERS LIKELY & MAYBE A THUNDERSTORM POSSIBLE ON FRIDAY

Showers and maybe just enough instability will be present for a few claps of thunder to occur in some of the activity from the outer rain bands of Delta as they move farther into Central Alabama throughout the day on Friday. Much of the area may be dry during a good portion of the morning hours, but shower activity looks to increase starting just before the afternoon and persisting through the remainder of the day. While it may not rain all day long, showers can occur at any time. At this point, the threat of any severe weather from Delta will stay to our southwest over southern Mississippi and all of southeastern Louisiana. Afternoon highs will be in the upper 70s to the lower 80s.

MAJOR COLLEGE FOOTBALL GAMES

So I might get some boo birds headed my way on this, but the Alabama/Ole Miss game has been pushed back to a 6:30 pm kickoff on Saturday in Oxford. Here’s the bad news… the center of Delta (according to both the European and GFS models) will still be just a touch south of due west from Oxford as of 7:00 pm. That is about when you could expect the worst of the wind gusts at the stadium, plus they would still have a threat of a brief spin-up tornado. Personally, I would have postponed the game until Sunday afternoon, but I don’t get paid to schedule the games.

The Auburn/Arkansas game is set to kick off at 3:00 pm on Saturday at Jordan-Hare Stadium, and while rain and some breezy conditions may be expected, I believe the center of Delta will be too far west to be able to cause any issues.

UAB is off this week. Their next game will be at Legion Field on October 17th against Western Kentucky. Kickoff is currently scheduled for 12:30 pm.

THE TROPICS

As of 10:00 am, Hurricane Delta was packing winds at 105 MPH (category 2), with movement to the northwest at 14 MPH, and was located about 400 miles south of Cameron, Louisiana. Here is the list of watches and warnings associated with Delta:

Storm Surge Warning: From High Island, Texas, to Ocean Springs, Mississippi, including Calcasieu Lake, Vermilion Bay, Lake Pontchartrain, Lake Maurepas, and Lake Borgne.

Hurricane Warning: From High Island, Texas, to Morgan City, Louisiana.

Tropical Storm Warnings: From west of High Island to San Luis Pass, Texas; from east of Morgan City, Louisiana, to the mouth of the Pearl River, including New Orleans; and Lake Pontchartrain and Lake Maurepas.

Tropical Storm Watch: East of the mouth of the Pearl River to Bay St. Louis, Mississippi.

The next update from the National Hurricane Center will be out around 1:00 pm this afternoon.

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