Wet At Times; A Cooling Trend
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EARLY MORNING RADAR PEEK: A large rain mass continues over Mobile and Baldwin Counties, near the Gulf Coast, where amounts to almost 10 inches were reported last night and early this morning. A flash flood warning for Baldwin County is expiring as I write this… the heaviest rain is pushing into the Florida Panhandle. Up this way the radar is pretty quiet with only a few isolated showers over the northern half of the state at daybreak.
The overall forecast is on track; the upper low over the Gulf Coast will shear apart and move southeast today, while the cold upper trough over the nation’s mid-section will evolve into a deep, cold core upper low over Oklahoma by tomorrow. Model consistency is good, and forecast confidence fairly high now. Let’s take it one day at a time…
TODAY: The sky will be mostly cloudy with a few passing, light rain showers. Nothing organized or heavy, and the high will be in the low 70s.
TOMORROW: The upper low will be on the Oklahoma/Arkansas border, and rain should become widespread across most of Alabama. Wet weather is likely most of the day, and we will have a hard time getting out of the 60s due to the rain. Rain will continue tomorrow night. No severe weather, and probably not much thunder. Rain amounts of 1 inch are likely… not enough to create major flooding problems.
SATURDAY: The GFS and NAM are now in very good agreement; the rain should end from west to east Saturday morning, and by 2:00 or so all of the rain should be east of the state in Georgia as a dry slot rotates into our state. Bottom line is that most places will go from rain Saturday morning to sunshine Saturday afternoon… the day will be unusually cool for May with a high only in the mid 60s.
SUNDAY: We will begin the day with a very cool morning; the early morning low will be in the mid 40s. After morning sunshine, we expect scattered showers to form Sunday afternoon due to the instability created by very cold air aloft (the upper low will be near Memphis). The chance of any one spot seeing a shower Sunday afternoon is about one in three, and the showers will end once the sun goes down. We stay cool with a high in the mid to upper 60s.
MONDAY: The GFS puts the cold core upper low right on top of North Alabama. This means occasional showers are likely, and due to the cold air aloft, some hail will be possible in the showers. Maybe even a bit of graupel. And, if the ULL does indeed go right over us, we might not get out of the 50s… that would be a good 25 degrees below average for early May around here.
The upper low finally moves out Tuesday with only a small risk of a shower, and Wednesday and Thursday should be dry with a slow warming trend.
TALLADEGA SUPERSPEEDWAY: Just a few scattered showers around the track today, but widespread rain is likely tomorrow and tomorrow night, which will be very problematic for qualifying and the Arca 250. The high today will be in the low 70s… followed by upper 60s tomorrow.
Saturday morning will be wet, but we now believe the rain will end at the Superspeedway by midday Saturday, meaning good weather for the Aaron’s 312 Saturday afternoon with a clearing sky. The high Saturday will be only in the mid 60s.
Sunday morning should be mostly sunny at Talladega, and very cool with an early morning low in the 40s. But, scattered showers will form during the afternoon hours. The chance of a shower during the Aaron’s 499 is about one in three. So, a delay is possible, but they should get the race in. The high Sunday afternoon will be in the mid to upper 60s.
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I will be doing a weather program this morning at Centre Middle School in Cherokee County… be looking for the next Weather Xtreme video here by 4:00 or so this afternoon. Enjoy the day!
Category: Alabama's Weather
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James Spann is one of the most recognized and trusted television meteorologists in the industry. He holds the AMS CCM designation and television seals from the AMS and NWA. He is a past winner of the Broadcast Meteorologist of the Year from both professional organizations.Subscribe
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