RISK OF STRONG STORMS THURSDAY IN P.M. HOURS… RZW Exec partners, good Wednesday evening. Happy New Year! 2020 is set to start off with a chance of strong to severe storms on Thursday. The big takeaways from the long form post (below) is that we have somewhat of a “double barrel risk” on Thursday into early Friday.
Confidence is LOW that we may have a few supercell storms develop tomorrow (Thursday) afternoon and evening.
Confidence is HIGH that we will have a line of weakening thunderstorms late Thursday evening that will move across our region.
The Storm Prediction Center maintains our area in their Level 1 (out of 5) marginal risk, for now. Outlook upgrades will be possible overnight. Please let me know if you have any specific decision support needs. Have a great evening! See the information we will debut publicly in the next 30 minutes below.
STRONG STORMS POSSIBLE THURSDAY AFTERNOON INTO THE OVERNIGHT HOURS… The entirety of south Alabama and northwest Florida remains involved in the low-end, Level 1 (out of 5) marginal severe weather risk valid Thursday evening into Friday morning. The two concerns will be a main line of thunderstorms that will likely weaken as it approaches our area from the west late Thursday evening. Before we get to that, there is also a conditional risk of a few discrete, supercell thunderstorms that could produce tornadoes on Thursday afternoon. While the core risk appears to be setting up just to our west across parts of southern Mississippi and eastern Louisiana, we all have at least a low-end risk across all parts of south Alabama and northwest Florida. Let’s look at details.
CONDITIONAL FIRST ROUND OF STORMS… The first risk of severe weather on Thursday will be a CONDITIONAL risk of strong to severe storms in the afternoon and early evening hours. By “conditional,” I mean certain things will have to happen in order for this first threat to materialize at all. There is a chance this first threat won’t ever happen, but more than a few models are advertising this potential, thus I believe it is wise to at least mention the possibility. The concern is that we could have some isolated, discrete supercell thunderstorms capable of producing a few tornadoes across south Alabama and northwest Florida. If the cap can break, storms will grow to be quite tall in the atmosphere, potentially leading to severe storms that have the potential to produce a few tornadoes. Looking at model guidance, I would suggest there is a 30-40% chance of this first threat materializing with a 60-70% chance of us just having a few general showers and thunderstorms tomorrow afternoon and early evening. I’ll be closely monitoring radar trends tomorrow (Thursday) afternoon. We will bring you the latest in the RedZone Weather app.
MAIN LINE OF STORMS APPROACHES THURSDAY EVENING… Thunderstorms will develop to our west tomorrow (Thursday) morning. This will probably be a line (QLCS/squall line) of storms that forms across west Mississippi and east-central Louisiana. This line of storms will move eastward throughout the day and will probably be set to move into the far western stretches of south Alabama by 8PM tomorrow evening. The line of storms will move across our area from 8PM Thursday to 6AM Friday. If storms train over the same areas, we could have some flash flooding issues set up. The greatest chance of this will be over west Alabama in Clarke, Wilcox, Marengo, Choctaw, and Washington counties. This line of storms will likely be weakening as it enters our area and ultimately runs out of instability to work with.
GREATER RISK ACROSS SOUTH MISSISSIPPI & EAST LOUISIANA… The Storm Prediction Center (SPC) introduced a Level 2 (out of 5) slight risk of scattered severe storms for parts of southern Mississippi and eastern Louisiana. These are the focus areas where the “severe weather ingredients” will be primed to produce tornadoes and damaging wind gusts. We note there is a possibility SPC will upgrade at least part of our area into this Level 2 risk zone in their overnight update. We’ll bring you the latest when it happens in the RedZone Weather app. Be sure to check back with me for the latest on our local risk level on Thursday morning in the forecast video.
SEVERE WEATHER & RAIN TIMING… While a few rain showers are happening this morning across our region and just to our west, the core of the rain issues won’t happen until later today into tonight. There is a good chance some of us will remain dry throughout the day, although I can’t rule out isolated showers pretty much all day. The core of the severe weather issues will happen from 4PM Thursday to 1AM Friday, although as mentioned in the second paragraph (above) there is a conditional risk of supercells that could produce tornadoes as early as 1PM.
MAIN CONCERNS: TORNADOES & DAMAGING WIND GUSTS… The hazards we’ll be most concerned about with this event will be the tornado potential and the chance of stronger storms that could produce damaging straight line wind gusts. Flash flooding could also become an issue, primarily across west Alabama in areas west of the Alabama River.
SURFACE LOW DEVELOPS TO OUR WEST TONIGHT… Why all the nasty weather potential? It’s because of a surface low developing to our west tonight across the northwestern Gulf of Mexico. This area of low pressure will tap into an impulse/shortwave moving by in the atmosphere on Thursday, leading to a chance of strong to severe storms.
APP… If you haven’t already downloaded the RedZone Weather app, now is a great time to do that. redzoneweather.com/app is the link to the free download. Once you have the RZW app installed on your iOS or Android device, be sure to visit the Alerts tab to turn on the specific notifications you’d like to receive. All notifications are handcrafted by me. No automation and we promise not to bug you!
Let me know if you have any questions or concerns. My next forecast video will be posted by 7:15AM on Thursday. See you then!