Cold, Icy Grip on Central Alabama

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If you are looking for some nice warm weather, do not look here in Central Alabama. It looks like the icy hand of winter is not about to relinquish its hold on us for at least a week or so with some interesting weather ahead.

For today, some snow showers/flurries were moving across Central Alabama quickly so any snowfall will be brief with no accumulation expected. The high this afternoon will be in the lower 40s, so it will remain very chilly. We might see some peeks at the sun by late afternoon.

Our warmest day for the next week is likely to be tomorrow. We should see a good amount of sun, so the afternoon high will climb into the lower 50s. This is actually about where we ought to see daily highs for early February. But the morning low of 27 will be a bit below our typical low for this time of year.

After a quiet Sunday the weather pattern gets active again. A strong short wave in the upper flow will move quickly out of the southern Rockies across the Southeast US bringing a mixture of weather. Once again we may be dealing with a shallow cold air situation that poses significant challenges for the models. While the whole column shows very cold as seen by the 1000-500 millibar thickness, the model sounding suggests a warm layer through 6,000 feet. I’m not convinced the warm layer will be there, so I think there is a reasonably good chance for snow with this system, but it does appear that precipitation will be light. The main elements will be to see how warm we get Sunday, however, I think we also have to remember that there is a significant snow field to the north and west of us which will also play a role in keeping the atmosphere cold. This whole system will bear some careful watching over the next 48 hours.

Due to the fast flow, the system zips out quickly with a chilly but dry day for Tuesday. But don’t look now because here comes yet another system out of the southern Rockies as the winter express keeps a steady flow of trains trekking across the Southeast. Another upper trough moves into the picture Wednesday bring another winter weather threat for Thursday. This is much too far into the future to be very specific, but snow and icing appear likely for some parts of Central Alabama. With the fast flow in place, the system moves quickly out bringing clearing skies for Friday as we remain cold.

By next weekend, the GFS is suggesting a slight northward nudge to the overall flow which might allow us to get back to seasonal temperatures. In fact, looking further afield into voodoo country, the overall pattern seems to shift to troughs east and west of us with ridging over the middle of the country. This could spell something of a warm up from the extreme chill of the winter – but it is voodoo so we’ll see.

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I skipped the Skycam views in this video to show a few of the photographs my daughter took during the blizzard in Chicago. I think she did a fabulous job on capturing some of the winter storm in her photos, so please don’t shoot a proud Dad for showing off his kid’s photos. Stay warm whatever you do today and Godspeed.

-Brian-

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Category: Alabama's Weather