Saturday Afternoon Forecast Discussion – 12 p.m.

Skies are clear across West Alabama this afternoon as drier low level air continues to be pushed into the state under an easterly flow. Satellite imagery is showing early signs of an upper level cyclonic circulation developing over Florida. The system will take several days to get organized, which means the rain will likely hold off moving into Central Alabama over the weekend. There is still a small chance of rain over our sotuhern counties on Sunday due to deep easterly flow which could bring some showers into area.

There is still much uncertainty regarding rain chances for Monday. Both the NAM and GFS show an upper level impulse moving around the north side of an upper low on Monday, triggering scattered showers. The ECMWF model does not show much rain across the area on Monday and keeps it more over Georgia. For now the forecast will show the best rain chances on Monday assuming a fairly significant swath of rain develops on the north side of the upper low.

Long term – Tuesday through Friday

By Tuesday, the surface low begins to lift northeast and pushing the heavier rainfall across Georgia and into the Carolinas. All the models keep the heavier rainfall east of Alabama on Tuesday and the GFS does not show any rainfall across Central Alabama. The NAM and ECMWF keep the rain mainly east of I-65. The main change to the forecast for Tuesday was to keep the rain east of I-65. Wednesday still looks like a transition day as a Florida system lifts out into the Atlantic and upstream trough moves in from the plains states. The ECMWF models dry up the rain along the plains states short wave trough while the GFS keeps some precipitation along the surface front as it moves through area. There should be enough lift ahead of upper trough axis for some shower development. The models have also been trending towards a more stable air mass across area on Thursday and thunderstorm chances seem to be decreasing with each run. A much drier and cooler air mass moves into Alabama on Friday.

Daniel Sparkman
dsparkman@wvuatv.com
WVUA Weather