FORECAST:
Saturday (High 66, Low 57): Rainy. Cool and breezy.
Sunday (High 70, Low 56): Mostly cloudy and breezy. Numerous rounds of rain showers are possible.
Monday (High 73, Low 60): Rain showers likely. Thunderstorms possible.
Tuesday (High 75, Low 58): Partly to mostly cloudy. Numerous rounds of showers/thunderstorms are possible.
EXTENDED OUTLOOK:
Wednesday (High 82, Low 59): Mostly sunny with a 20% chance of showers/thunderstorms.
Thursday (High 87, Low 62): Mostly sunny.
Friday (High 90, Low 67): Mostly sunny with a 20% chance of showers/thunderstorms.
Saturday (High 86, Low 69): Partly cloudy with a 30% chance of showers/thunderstorms.
PRONÓSTICO:
Sábado (Máxima: 66, Mínima: 57): Lluvioso. Fresco y ventoso.
Domingo (Máxima: 70, Mínima: 56): Mayormente nublado y ventoso. Posibles numerosas rondas de lluvias.
Lunes (Máxima: 73, Mínima: 60): Probabilidad de lluvias. Posibles tormentas.
Martes (Máxima: 75, Mínima: 58): Parcialmente a mayormente nublado. Posibles numerosas rondas de lluvias.
PERSPECTIVA EXTENDIDA:
Miércoles (Máxima: 82, Mínima: 59): Mayormente soleado con un 20% de probabilidad de lluvias/tormentas.
Jueves (Máxima: 87, Mínima: 62): Mayormente soleado.
Viernes (Máxima: 90, Mínima: 67): Mayormente soleado con un 20% de probabilidad de lluvias/tormentas.
Sábado (Máxima 86, Mínima 69): Parcialmente nublado con un 30 % de probabilidad de lluvias o tormentas eléctricas.
NOTES:
The National Weather Service in Huntsville has put together a page through Iowa Environmental Mesonet that more-or-less collects the reports of damaging winds and hail that have occurred in the region recently.
This format is more to my tastes, which I copied and pasted into a post. It shows well-written details about the wind damage that happened in Jackson County on May 2nd and also the survey of the tornado that affected Jackson and Dekalb Counties that day, from about Rosalie to Sulphur Springs.
The NWS Nashville has compiled a "storymaps" page of this year's significant weather events. And let's face it, we've had a fair number of them this year.
Roughly a couple weeks ago was the anniversary of our April 27, 2011 tornado outbreak - one of those rare ones like April 3, 1974 that will never be forgotten by anybody who lives through it. I did know two college professors who were out dating and having fun that day, who ended up getting married. So sue me for looking for silver linings these days . . .
The Weather Service in Nashville is also still doing Weather101 classes that you can take online for free. I haven't taken one in a while because life has gotten hectic in several ways, but I strongly recommend them to those who do have the time to spare, who want to learn more about the weather. I think it's a wonderful thing they are doing, every year now.
And this week was actually Hurricane Preparedness Week. Really any time we're getting toward summer, people down toward the Gulf Coast especially need to start paying attention and be ready to take precautions if a hurricane were to form. We had an active season last year. Some of the damage last summer was devastating, even well inland, Northeast of here in the Appalachians.
DISCUSSION:
We've got rain showers rotating through mainly Central and South Alabama tonight, around a Low pressure system that's centered off the coast of Louisiana, down there in the Gulf, or DA GUFF, as some call it. You can see some thunderbumpers over the waters there on the satellite imagery. Where there's more moist, unstable air down there.
It's cooler up here, with winds turning back to the North tonight behind a cold front. This will probably be the last month we'll see many cold fronts until about September. At least that's the way it usually goes. So enjoy these cool snaps while they last. All the rain we're getting could help us have a milder summer, the way the moisture soaks into the ground, keeps temperatures down later. More than if we stayed dry for long periods of time.
We had a partly to mostly sunny day overall in the Tennessee Valley today. It was breezy at times, and winds were variable. We had some fog this morning. The High in Cullman was 75 with a morning Low of 55. Jasper saw a High of 77 and Low of 55. Haleyville had a High of 76 and a Low of 55. Huntsville saw a High of 77 and Low of 61 today. Nashville saw a lot more clouds today overall, High of 74 and Low of 58 there.
This weekend looks pretty wet. And that will last through at least part of the coming week.
Tomorrow looks rainy and breezy as that low pressure system winds through the region. High should be about 66-67, Low in the upper 50's.
Then starting Sunday, a setup is trying to happen that is called a REX Block, where a High pressure system is directly to the North of a closed Low pressure system.
The NAM isn't showing the rain as widespread on Sunday as the GFS. And sometimes I think the models can overdo rain chances this time of year.
Looks like a mostly cloudy day, breezy again, High temperature near 70 or so, Low in the upper 50's again. And I'm going to bring the rain chance down to 50%, so any one spot has about a 50/50 shot at getting a shower during the day. Don't think it rains quite as much and as widespread as on Saturday though.
Then on Monday, rain chances go up to 60-70% again, so rain is likely on Monday. Probably another breezy day. High temperature getting up into the lower 70's, Low temperature near 60. So we may have enough instability for some thunderstorms. You always have to watch for stronger storms through the end of May, but nothing jumps out at me as showing any significant chance for organized severe thunderstorms. This is more of a rain problem, where several days of rain could lead to isolated flooding issues here and there. Even the risk of that doesn't look especially high though. We need this rain. It makes for some yucky days right now, but like James Spann says a lot, that moisture in the soil sure does help us out later in the summer months. Which we're nearly there.
And really, with this latest model guidance, it looks like the REX Block idea may not come to be after all, that I mentioned earlier. I'd read that in a local forecast discussion before I looked at this for myself and passed it along. It did look like that on the first day or two of the guidance, but as we get into next week, I'm not sure it's going to set up after all. I remember the forecaster saying that the model guidance was too optimistic in how quickly it was clearing out the rain in a pattern like that. But this isn't looking too impressive for that setup after all. I've been out of the loop for a while, finding my way around again. It's better if a forecaster is keeping up with the weather from day to day, which I haven't been for a while.
Anyway going to lower rain chances to 50% for Tuesday. That upper Low pressure system is opening up and moving Northward out of the region. Looks like a High in the mid-70's, Low in the upper 50's. Thunderstorms are possible, and we might need to monitor for any stronger storms, especially given the time of year. But it doesn't look too threatening for any organized severe weather. We're still in the month of May, so if you want to play it safe, keep an eye on things, but I wouldn't be too worried about it either.
Then on Wednesday it looks like we'll see more sun than clouds overall with only a 20% chance of rain, about the same isolated rain/thunderstorm chance you'd see on a typical summer afternoon. Highs should climb into the lower 80's with a Low in the upper 50's or near 60. Rain chances might be a little higher on the Tennessee side, but I think we'll be drying out for the most part mid-week.
Then on Thursday as we come under a ridge of high pressure, going to take the rain chance out altogether and just forecast mostly sunny skies and a really warm day, Highs in the mid-to-upper-80's and a Low in the lower 60's.
Then it looks like that ridge will relax just enough to let some moisture in for that low-end 20% summerlike chance of rain on Friday. But for the most part, partly to mostly sunny skies and just getting hot. Highs will be up near 90, Lows in the upper 60's. So this may be the best preview of summer we've seen yet this year.
Then next Saturday, the upper-level flow looks more zonal from the West, and we might see an increase in rain just a little, but still pretty widely scattered, High temperature might relax closer to the mid-80's with a Low in the upper 60's.
Rainfall totals will average about an inch on the Tennessee side and more like two inches over North Alabama over about the next week.
If anybody wants to support this blog and would like to see me treat it like a real job (because if I get paid, then it is a real job), here's the old
"Buy Me a Coffee" link that I never killed off. The Substack idea is on hold for now. I'm going through some really rough times that I'm not willing to detail on a public forum like this. Discussion of them is welcome among people I know and trust. But most of them do their discussions on Facebook more than anywhere else. When somebody in the family tree got hit by a truck recently (thankfully only minor injuries, but still, that's rough stuff for just walking across a crosswalk), that provoked some old-fashioned phone calls. But it takes something like that. And even then, it doesn't last. I am not a fan of these times we're living in overall. Something good may come out of it eventually, all the upheaval, but I don't think it will be any time soon. Measles are coming back and everything. And a lot of the paranoia that leads people to avoid basic vaccines (like for measles) is spread through sites like Facebook. And the people talking good sense basically go ignored. It's a grotesque, amplified version of that old game where you whisper something around the room, and it's totally confused by the time it makes it all the way around the circle. Did I mention I'm not a fan of it . . . uh, yeah . . . good night.
