Heat, Humidity, Daily Storms

REST OF WEEK: Through Friday look for pretty routine summer weather for August in Alabama. The days generally start off dry with ample sunshine, but as temperatures rise and instability builds, clouds begin to develop and those clouds turn into showers and storms by the afternoon and evening hours. Once again, the placement of the daily rain and storms is completely random, and it is almost impossible to know in advance when and where the convection develops. Each day, storms will produce intense rainfall over short periods of time and lots of lightning, so make sure you head indoor if thunder roars. Rain chances for the rest of this week will generally range from 20-40% each day. If you don’t see the rain, it will be hot and humid with highs ranging from the upper 80s to mid 90s, but if you do see rain, temperatures will be knocked down into the 70s and 80s.

Also, we will mention the upper-level flow is from the northwest this week and anytime you get northwest flow aloft in the warmer months, you do have to look upstream for the potential for a MCS (Mesoscale Convective System) or area of organized thunderstorms to develop in the Plains or Midwest and move southeast towards Alabama. Some of the model data suggest a couple of these could develop this week, and that means we could have to adjust the forecast accordingly…just something we are going to be watching for through the week.

WEEKEND WEATHER & BEYOND: For now we will stick with a persistence forecast as there looks to be no real change in the overall weather pattern. Expect hot and humid conditions each day with upper 80s to mid 90s, and each afternoon expect those random hit or miss showers and storms. We could see an uptick in our rain chances over the weekend with an approaching surface boundary.

TROPICAL UPDATE: For the North Atlantic, Caribbean Sea, and the Gulf of Mexico: Tropical cyclone formation is not expected during the next five days.