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4:45PM December 28, 2024

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OVERNIGHT SEVERE WEATHER RISK TO HAPPEN ACROSS ALABAMA & N.W. FLORIDA… Tonight will be a night when we all have to have multiple ways to hear urgent weather warnings as severe storms will be possible across south Alabama and northwest Florida. Several tornadoes and severe thunderstorms have caused damage this afternoon across parts of Texas, Louisiana, and Mississippi. One particularly long track tornado has caused 70 miles of damage from Texas into southwest Louisiana. A Particularly Dangerous Situation (PDS) Tornado Watch is in effect for parts of TX, LA, and MS. I expect a Tornado Watch will probably be needed at some point this evening for parts of Alabama and northwest Florida. In addition to the tornado threat, I am also particularly concerned about a potential for widespread, damaging wind gusts capable of causing power outages across the region. We encourage everyone to charge your devices NOW before the threat of severe storms starts in our local area.

SEVERE WEATHER TIMING – TONIGHT INTO SUNDAY MORNING… Thunderstorms have not materialized so far today (as of 4:45PM) across our local area. This is probably due to the stabilization of the atmosphere by the round of thunderstorms that happened early this morning. While a low-end risk of severe storms will exist until 10PM, I expect MOST of the strong to severe storms to hold off until then. The main time frame for severe storms across southwest Alabama and northwest Florida will be from 10PM to 7AM, squarely in the overnight hours, unfortunately. It is important that everyone has multiple ways to hear warnings overnight. You need a device that can be loud and wake you up in case your specific location goes under a tornado warning or a severe thunderstorm warning. Storms should be completely to our east by 7AM. Quieter weather is expected on Sunday during the daytime hours and into Monday.

MORNING STORMS CAUSE A WRINKLE IN THE FORECAST… The round of thunderstorms that happened in the pre-dawn hours, mainly across coastal counties, has hindered any thunderstorms from developing across south Alabama and northwest Florida so far today. Compare this to areas to our west that have active tornado warnings ongoing at the time I am producing this update, due to discrete, isolated supercells. It remains to be seen exactly how long the atmosphere will continue to “behave” across our local area, although I am encouraged by some of the model trends I have seen in the last few hours indicating our main severe weather risk may end up being the squall line that moves through late tonight into early Sunday morning. Please understand, there is still time for discrete, isolated thunderstorms to develop before the line gets to our area. The squall line itself may be quite significant too, with the potential for widespread damaging wind gusts AND embedded tornadoes. So even if we do not see isolated, discrete storms ahead of the line, the line of storms itself could be particularly intense. The best case scenario is that no discrete storms form ahead of the line across our local area AND the line of storms itself is weaker than expected. Hopefully that will be the case, but hope is not a plan. Have a way to hear warnings overnight

TORNADO WARNING POLICY… Any time there is an active tornado warning in effect for southwest Alabama or northwest Florida, we provide uninterrupted, live video coverage on Facebook Live and in the RedZone Weather app. Our detailed coverage commitment is outlined at redzoneweather.com/coverage. We are proud to cover all parts of Escambia (AL), Covington, Monroe, Conecuh, Baldwin, Mobile, Clarke, Washington, Butler, Escambia (FL), Santa Rosa, and Okaloosa counties. If you live in any locale in those counties, be sure to tune into our coverage whenever there is an active tornado warning!

APP ALERTS… redzoneweather.com/app is the link where you can download the free RedZone Weather app. We post brief updates throughout each day in the app, keeping you up-to-date about the latest happenings in weather across south Alabama and northwest Florida. Once you have the free app downloaded to your iOS or Android device, be sure to visit the Alerts tab (lower right corner) then tap the large Alert Settings button to customize the alerts you would like to receive straight from me.

I will have updates posted throughout the evening, as needed, in the RedZone Weather app. Stay safe!

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