RESHIFTING FOCUS TO NICE LOCAL WEATHER… The tropics remain active, but a gorgeous, hot weekend is ahead for south Alabama and northwest Florida. High temperatures will be in the low- to mid-90s each day with plenty of sunshine hours at the local beaches. Friday Night Lights across the region will be dry for 95% of the games played this evening. Game time temps (7PM) start around 84°, falling to the upper-70s by the 4th quarter (around 9PM). Let’s look at details from the tropics this morning…
– Hurricane Florence continues to lash the North Carolina coastline this morning with big waves, extreme storm surge, heavy rain, flash flooding, and isolated tornadoes. It’s a mess of things and will continue to be in eastern North Carolina and eastern South Carolina this weekend. The center of Florence will likely cross the coast later today. Impacts, unfortunately, will continue through Sunday into Monday. No Alabama or northwest Florida impacts are expected from Florence.
– An Air Force Reconnaissance “Hurricane Hunter” aircraft crew investigated INVEST 95L yesterday. That’s the tropical wave in the western Gulf of Mexico that will move into Texas/Mexico later today or early on Saturday. The Hurricane Hunters did not find a low-level circulation, thus the system is not a classified tropical storm at this time. There is still a brief window for development today, but honestly the classification probably won’t matter much as impacts will be the same. Heavy rain and flash flooding will be possible in southern Texas and northeast Mexico this weekend.
– Tropical Storm Isaac continues to struggle in the eastern Caribbean Sea (great news!). Strong northwesterly shear and dry mid-level air are likely to cause Isaac to weaken to a tropical depression or even become an open tropical wave within the next day or so. There is some model evidence that Isaac could degenerate over the next 24 hours then reform next week in the western Caribbean, but majority of the models point to complete dissipation with no regeneration. We’ll certanly keep you posted, but no need to lose sleep over Isaac anytime soon.
– Tropical Storms Helene and Joyce are in the far eastern part of the Atlantic and will accelerate northeast over the next few days before becoming extratropical. No impacts in North America are expected.
APP… I’ll have plenty of updates this weekend here in the RedZone Weather app. Let me know if you have any weather-related questions. Have a great weekend!