Cold Remains the Watch Word
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It is definitely a frosty morning across Central Alabama with morning temperatures well down into the 20s. Most airport observing sites were reporting lows in the middle 20s but some of those normally colder valleys could have reached into the teens. One more nice day today with a good supply of sunshine with passing cirrus ahead of the next developing storm system.
The next storm system, a surface low forming over Southeast Texas and a short wave trough, will bring clouds Wednesday along with rain. Looks like the bulk of the rain will not arrive until late Wednesday and into early Thursday. And this system moves by quickly ushering in cold air for the first day of 2010.
With a good trough becoming established over the East Coast of the US, it will keep much of the eastern US in a cold pattern. And if the GFS is correct, it looks like that cold pattern will stay with us for the first four to five days of the new year.
As the surface low moves up the East Coast, it will certainly bring another round of snow to the Mid-Atlantic states up into New England. While not as powerful as the last storm system, it is going to add to whatever snow cover remains there. For us, it continues to appear likely we’ll get around one half to three-quarters of an inch of rain with some spots getting a bit more. On Friday, New Year’s Day, we’ll be dealing with the age old weather dilemma for the Southeast US – will there be enough moisture after the cold air arrives to give us at least some snow flurries. And I think that is certainly a possibility, but it does not seem likely that we’ll get anything significant to write home about. I can’t think of anything I’d rather do than sit on my front porch and watch it snow. Perhaps with a future storm system. With the huge snow cover to our north and northwest along with the extended southward push of the troughs and the active southern jet stream, I know we’ll need to be vigilant for a snow producing system.
The trough remains on the East Coast for several days into 2010, so the cold weather will be sticking with us. That snow cover to our north and northwest will have an impact on the air coming our way, so be careful on the MOS guidance since it might not be taking that factor into account for our temperatures. Over the weekend, temperatures for Central Alabama are likely to struggle to even get into the 40s. We might even see our highs Sunday and Monday have trouble climbing much above freezing.
In the longer range, the GFS continues an active flow. There just plain is not skill in specifics when you are that far into the future, but the trend of an active pattern is something I think we can count on.
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I hope your Tuesday is a good one. Enjoy the sunshine before the clouds and rain arrive later tomorrow. Godspeed.
-Brian-
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