Gordon Makes Landfall Tonight, Possibly As A Hurricane
Tropical storm Gordon is now in the north-central Gulf of Mexico, with max sustained winds of 65 mph. The official forecast from the National Hurricane center has Gordon reaching category 1 strength just before a landfall along the Mississippi coast. The most significant impacts- including rain possibly totaling over half an inch and hurricane force winds- should be confined to those areas. Impacts to central and south Alabama (minus the Alabama coastline) should be minimal. We will be monitoring the radar closely, since we have the potential to see some isolated spin-up tornadoes within Gordon’s convective band. It looks like that threat will span from this afternoon possibly up until tomorrow afternoon.
Gordon quickly spins down and weakens once it makes it’s way onshore. It could still be near tropical storm force Wednesday morning with the center near Jackson, Mississippi, but it should move into southern Arkansas by Thursday. That means that we’re back to normal on Thursday, with highs back in the low 90s with some scattered afternoon storms.
It looks like we’ll be in that pattern for some time- you can expect highs in the low 90s for Friday, Saturday, and Sunday. Rain chances look a touch lower Friday, but slightly higher over the weekend. At least isolated showers and storms are possible during the afternoons early next week. High temperatures reach the low 90s, with warm and muggy nights in the 70s.
