Add Wet to the Cool Weather

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Yesterday was another cool-ish August day for Central Alabama with afternoon highs mainly in the 70s – that’s about 20 degrees below the 30-year average highs for the middle of August. Add to the cool pattern rain, and we might not get out of the 60s today. The Birmingham Airport only hit 70 for a high. Tuscaloosa reached 79 while Anniston was a cool 69 – the effects of the wedge-like pattern showing up nicely. A pattern certainly tough on forecasting since it is hard to imagine a 69 high in the middle of August in Central Alabama.

The stationary frontal boundary which brought a band of 4 to 6 inches of rain to the Gulf Coast of Northwest Florida has meandered a tad northward as weak surface lows move along the boundary. This has brought rain further north into much of Central Alabama. So look for a cool, cloudy, wet day very untypical for the middle of August. High temperatures today should range from the upper 60s to the middle 70s across the area, cooler in the east due to the wedge-like conditions with the strong easterly flow. And the beach forecast remains wet, too, with highs in the lower 80s.

The upper closed low over the Middle Mississippi River Valley remains a big player. Unlike the forecast model projections yesterday, the upper low and the associated weakness do not appear to leave and will be sticking around for much of the upcoming week. This keeps us in an unsettled weather pattern that remains cool. The overall strength of the upper low is forecast to weaken, but with the highly tropical air mass in place, we will be including showers in the forecast for the next full week. The strength of the easterly flow should abate somewhat and allow temperatures to climb back into the lower and middle 80s by mid week. So we slowly get back to something a bit more like a summer pattern with daily afternoon showers and slightly warmer conditions. It is interesting to note that the GFS MOS guidance continues to push numbers into the lower 90s by the end of the week, but this is definitely not the summer to use the MOS guidance numbers which continue to be much too high.

Thunderstorms coming out of the Gulf into Southwest Alabama could become marginally severe if we see a little bit more destabilization of the atmosphere there. However, the deep tropical moisture points more to heavy rain events. The tropics are still active though Erin is back down to tropical depression status. The disturbance in the Southwest Gulf continued to move northwestward with little chance for development. Another wave has moved off the African continent and has a low potential for tropical cyclone development in the next several days.

Model graphics were not available out into week 2 this morning, but even without the graphics, I’m not expecting to see much change in the overall pattern.

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Thanks for staying tuned to the Blog. Watch for additional posts on this unusual August weather. James Spann will have the next Weather Xtreme Video first thing on Monday morning. Godspeed.

-Brian-

Category: Alabama's Weather