Much Cooler By Thursday

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RIGHT NOW: Temperatures at 2:00 range from 84 at Auburn to 89 at Muscle Shoals. Birmingham was reporting 86 degrees… two degrees below our record high today of 88 set way back in 1919. We will come very close to that record before the afternoon is over.

MID-WEEK: To the west, active convection continues over the Ark-La-Tex region associated with a big upper low over Kansas. This feature will slowly weaken in coming days, but it will bring change in our weather. We will continue to mention a chance of scattered showers and thunderstorms tomorrow afternoon and tomorrow night. SPC maintains a slight risk of severe weather over much of North and Central Mississippi, and the extreme western part of Alabama. The main threat will come from large hail and damaging winds, but we expect the activity to weaken quickly across our state tomorrow evening as the sun goes down and the air becomes more stable. Rain amounts should be light and spotty; the 12Z NAM is printing only 0.06″ for Birmingham, with the GFS showing 0.16. We will take whatever we get, but this won’t be a really widespread, beneficial rain. The main window for scattered showers and storms will come from about 3:00 p.m. tomorrow until 3:00 a.m. Wednesday. The sky will be partly sunny Wednesday and temperatures will be cooler with a high only in the mid 70s.

THURSDAY THROUGH SUNDAY: More delightful autumn weather, with sunny pleasant days and clear chilly nights. Highs will be in the 70s, with lows in the 40s. The normally colder spots, most likely, will reach the upper 30s early Friday morning. Picture perfect weather for both high school and college football games across Alabama Friday night and Saturday.

TROPICS: Looks like the system near the Central American coast will be upgraded to Tropical Storm Paula shortly. Steering currents are weak; this one will most likely drift to the northwest toward Mexico’s Yucatan peninsula. From there, most likely, it will turn east/northeast, perhaps clipping the southern tip of Florida in a week or so before heading out into the open Atlantic. One way or another it does not look like a Central Gulf Coast issue.

VOODOO LAND: Lots of model madness… the phased upper trough late this month comes and goes… it is not on the 12Z GFS, but I would not be shocked if it shows back up in future runs. This, if it happens, will bring widespread frost and some potential for a light freeze before Halloween. Unfortunately a big rain event really doesn’t show up on the 12Z GFS later this month, but again, I think that will change. See the Weather Xtreme video for more details.

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I had a wonderful time this morning on the campus of the University of West Alabama in Livingston…. I am writing this from Tuscaloosa where I will be live at 5:00 and 6:00 on ABC 33/40 from the annual “Nite on the Green” fund raiser for breast cancer research. The next Weather Xtreme video will be posted here by 7:00 a.m. tomorrow…

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