Cold December Days

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THIS AFTERNOON AND TONIGHT: If you went exclusively on computer model output, you would think we should be in the upper 50s this afternoon. Needless to say, that didn’t work as some communities are barely out of the 30s across North Alabama. Birmingham is at 44 degrees as I write this with a layer of mid-level clouds thanks to the sub-tropical jet stream overhead. Tonight will be cold with a low in the 30 to 35 degree range; the actual lows will depend on the clouds. Seems like they don’t want to go anywhere, so many places will bottom out just above freezing early tomorrow.

TOMORROW/FRIDAY: Clouds will thicken and lower during the day tomorrow in advance of the next Gulf wave. That will spread rain into South Alabama late tomorrow afternoon, with potential for some light rain as far north as Birmingham late tomorrow night. Friday still looks cold, damp, and raw with clouds, periods of light rain, and temperatures in the 40s. The heaviest rain will remain over the southern third of the state.

WEEKEND FORECAST: The weekend will be cold. A strong vorticity max will rotate through the bottom of the upper trough Saturday, and sure has the potential to squeeze out a few snow flurries over North Alabama. Moisture, however, will be very limited and nothing significant is expected. Then, Sunday looks cold and dry with a high in the low to mid 40s. MOS products (model output statistics) are too warm, just like today.

CHRISTMAS WEEK: Yep, the potential is there for a pre-Christmas winter storm somewhere across the Deep South. The pattern supports it, but there is absolutely no way we can be specific this far in advance. And, I would not wait on the edge of your chair for every global model run; they will all look different. I might suggest looking at the ensembles, which are more helpful at this stage of the game. See the Weather Xtreme video for the day by day walk through as we peek at the 12Z GFS and the GFS ensemble. I am not forecasting a White Christmas now, but I am simply saying everything we need is in place; it just needs to phase up at the right place at the right time. Will the snow come at Memphis, Jackson, Nashville, Birmingham, Montgomery, or Atlanta? I don’t know, and nobody knows now. We will be much more specific by the weekend. Just stay tuned. One way or another Christmas could be a very cold day for Dixie this year. Santa will feel right at home.

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I had a great road trip across the great state of Alabama today, driving the StormChaser through parts of Shelby, Chilton, Autauga, Bibb, Tuscaloosa, and Jefferson Counties with school stops at Verbena Elementary and Huntington Place Elementary. See the Verbena kids on the Pepsi KIDCAM today at 5:00 on ABC 33/40 News… the Huntington Place kids will be on the air tomorrow at 5:00. And, I am about to head out to the WalMart on Highway 150 in Hoover live weather at 5:00 and 6:00 as we are getting close to wrapping up this year’s Toys for Tots drive. Hope to see you there.

The next Weather Xtreme video will be posted by 7:00 a.m. tomorrow….

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