Severe Weather Possible Tonight for AL and TN, Tomorrow for FL and AL

 March 31, 2023

The Storm Prediction Center is forecasting a chance of severe weather for most of the area tonight into Saturday. Starting later today there is an Enhanced (orange) risk of severe weather for northwest Alabama including the Huntsville area and central Tennessee with Slight (yellow) and Marginal (dark green) risk areas extending to the east and southeast. The Enhanced risk area includes a 10% chance of tornadoes with EF2 or stronger tornadoes possible, a 5% hail risk, and a 30% chance of damaging winds, with winds stronger than 75 mph possible in the northwest corner of Alabama. The Slight risk area includes a 5% tornado risk, 5% hail risk, and 15% damaging wind risk. The Marginal risk area includes a 2% tornado risk, a 5% hail risk in part of the area, and a 5% damaging wind risk. Timing graphics are shown. Scattered showers are already ongoing in northern Alabama and will continue throughout the day. As a cold front moves into the area the severe risk ramps up in the late evening for northwest Alabama spreading east and southeast later in the evening and into the early morning hours tomorrow. A Marginal risk area for severe weather will remain into Saturday for southeast Alabama and a portion of the central Florida Panhandle away from the immediate coast. Isolated hail and damaging wind gusts are the main risks.

Day 1 (valid 7 a.m. today through 7 a.m. Saturday morning)

Huntsville Area

Eastern TN

Birmingham-Montgomery

Day 2 (7 a.m. Saturday through 7 a.m. Sunday)

Tallahassee Area

Those of you located in the higher risk areas know the drill but be sure to have a plan in place and multiple ways of receiving alerts as the worst weather looks to be in the overnight hours. This frontal system should clear our area later Saturday leaving us with a nice Sunday before rainy weather returns for what may be most of the week for different parts of the Southeast.

I made a separate post again to debrief last week's severe weather event here if you're interested. The short version is that the forecast verified very well for all 5 days before the weather system finally moved out of the area last Tuesday.

That's it for today, If there are any significant changes for today or tomorrow I'll let you know.

Have a good weekend,

Chris

Late March 2023 Southeast Multi-Day Severe Weather Event

March 31, 2023

I am again doing this debrief from the last severe weather event as a linked post so as to not clutter up my latest severe weather post. This event last 5 days and my post only covered the first two days for a few reasons. The first reason I didn't post again for the 26th onward was because we were on a vacation that ended the 26th. The second and the main reason I didn't post anymore for this event was because either none of my audience was located in the risk area (as on the 26th) or the risks were generally low (as with the 27th and 28th).

March 24

The 24th was a very busy severe weather day and I'm sure you're all aware of the deadly tornadoes that occurred in Mississippi. I have included verification maps for the morning forecast and the evening forecast so you can see how the risk area expanded later on. Overall it looks like the forecast captured the event quite well and the SPC expanded the higher risk areas to the northeast as a favorable environment moved in that direction.

March 25

The severe risk from the 24th continued into the next day as the same storm systems moved east-southeast. The risk started out as Marginal and then increased to Slight as the day progressed. Both forecasts capture the events of the day well.

March 26

On the 26th (Sunday), the front stalled across the Southeast as was predicted. As you can see below in the forecast progression from Day 3 (top) through Day 1 (bottom) this event was very well forecast (as was the March 24th event, I just don't show the progression above). I didn't post or email about this day because I don't know anyone that lives in the narrow strip where the severe weather risk was located. I probably should have but we were busy packing and checking out of our rental on the last day of vacation.

March 27

For the 27th and 28th the severe weather risk continued along the same stalled front but to a lesser degree. As stated above I didn't post or email for these days because the risk was generally low and I don't think any of my readers are located in the highest risk area, particularly for the 27th.

March 28

Overall this entire muti-day event was well forecast. If you're interested I found a very good technical analysis on Twitter that explained the difference between this event and others we've had this year that didn't quite pan out. It did a great job explaining the complexities of the forecast process and how not all of the ingredients needed for severe weather occur or don't occur at the right time in conjunction with the others.

Thanks for reading.

Chris

Severe Weather Possible Late Tomorrow into Saturday

March 23, 2023

The potential for severe weather is knocking at the door again for late tomorrow night through Saturday morning. While the main severe weather corridor for tomorrow will be to our west the Storm Prediction Center is forecasting an enhanced (orange) through marginal (dark green) risk of severe weather from northwest to southeast Alabama and western to eastern Tennessee respectively with a slight (yellow) risk area in between. A marginal risk area is indicated for the western most Florida Panhandle as well. The main threat from this event will be damaging winds with an isolated to scattered tornado threat and 5% hail threat for the northwestern half of Alabama as well. The severe weather risk will then carry over into Saturday morning with a marginal risk shown for the central Florida Panhandle and southeast Alabama. Details haven't been provided yet but I expect the main risk to be damaging winds with perhaps an isolated tornado risk (2-5%).

Timing graphics are shown for most regions. For Destin through Panama City expect the potential for severe weather Saturday from around 6 a.m. through noon or so. For central to eastern Tennessee expect severe weather from late Friday evening through daybreak Saturday.

Day 2 (7 a.m. Friday - 7 a.m. Saturday)

Day 3 Outlook (7 a.m. Saturday - 7 a.m. Sunday)

Huntsville Area

Birmingham Area

Mobile-Pensacola

The front bringing us the stormy weather looks like it will stall along the coast later Saturday into Sunday morning. This will leave us with messy weather that will slowly clear from Birmingham south from Sunday through Tuesday.

Below is the verification map from the March 17th severe weather event. I would have expected a few more damaging wind reports but the tornado forecast verified fairly well (although the two reported were located close together).

That's it for today. Again, I'm not expecting a high impact event for our area but it is always good to be prepared.

Have a good weekend,

Chris

Severe Weather Possible Tomorrow, Mostly Along the Near Coastal Areas

March 16, 2023

The Storm Prediction Center is again predicting severe weather tomorrow for the southeast. A slight (yellow) risk area is located over the coasts of Alabama and the Florida Panhandle and extends inland to just south of Montgomery. A marginal (dark green) risk area extends a bit farther north to just south of Birmingham. Damaging winds is the main threat with a low (2%) tornado risk also indicated along the coast. Timing will be Friday morning through evening with the chance of a tornado along the coast being the greatest later in the period. NWS Tallahassee hasn't put a timing graphic out yet but you can extrapolate from the Mobile graphic that storm timing will start and end a few hours later for the Destin-Panama City area. I expect the weather to clear the Panama City area around midnight.

Day 2 Outlook (7 a.m. Friday - 7 a.m. Saturday)

Mobile-Pensacola Area

Montgomery Area

Expect cooler temps to hang around through about the end of the week. The next shot at rain (maybe) looks to be along the coast Tuesday into Wednesday followed by another front sweeping through the whole region around next weekend.

Below is the verification map for the event last weekend (March 12). The Day 2 Outlook issued on Saturday for Sunday's weather was pretty bullish on the hail forecast especially for the Mobile-Pensacola area, including a forecast for large (>2") hail. The SPC backed off on this a bit Sunday morning but they were still showing a 15% chance across the slight risk area. The forecast wasn't too far off but I think there should have been more hail reports and 1-3 more tornado reports (forecast was 5% in the slight risk area) for this to verify. The forecast put out by NWS Birmingham expecting severe storms late Saturday into early Sunday didn't materialize either.

That's it for today. I don't expect the weather to be too bad tomorrow but be aware a few storms could be severe when making your plans for the day. The weekend should be cool but nice. Enjoy it, warm weather is right around the corner!

Chris

Severe Weather Possible Late Tonight Through Early Monday

March 11, 2023

Time for another round of spring severe weather. The Storm Prediction Center is forecasting a slight (yellow) risk of severe weather from just south of Birmingham down to the coast. A marginal (dark green) risk extends north and covers most of the rest of the state of Alabama and also covers the Apalachicola area. In the slight risk area there is a 5% tornado risk, 15% damaging wind risk, and interestingly for our area a 15% hail risk (including a chance for hail larger than 2" in the western Florida Panhandle). Lesser risks for these hazards exist in the marginal risk area as shown. Timing graphics are shown for areas that have produced them. The timing is interesting because even though the Day 2 Outlook doesn't technically take effect until 7 a.m. tomorrow morning the Birmingham NWS office is expecting severe weather as early as 1 a.m. tonight. Areas more to the south aren't expecting severe weather until sometime tomorrow.

Day 2 Outlook (valid 7 a.m. tomorrow through 7 a.m. Monday)

Montgomery-Birmingham Area

Mobile-Pensacola Area

Destin-Panama City

That's it for tonight. It'll be interesting to see if the hail threat materializes, that's fairly unusual for our area. Stay safe and as always make sure you have multiple ways of receiving alerts and monitor local media for up to date information.

By the way, this link is a post I made debriefing the last three severe weather events for anyone interested.

Have a good Sunday. Temps will be a little cooler than what we've had lately when the rain clears out. We'll see the next round of weather towards the end of the week followed by more cool weather.

Chris

2-16-2023 Through 3-3-2023 Severe Weather Debrief

March 10, 2023

I am behind debriefing three forecasts and instead of cluttering up the next severe weather post I'm going to debrief them here and provide the link.

First up is 2/16/2023 (original post here). My analysis of these events is not scientific, I do not dig into how the actual dynamic and thermodynamic environment evolved compared to the forecast, I'm really just looking at the storm reports compared to the morning forecast which is displayed nicely in the verification graphics. There is almost always a degree of uncertainty which isn't communicated in the outlook graphics but which can be gleaned by reading the forecast discussions. So for a forecast like shown below a moderate (red) forecast may be warranted by some things the forecasters are looking at but due to uncertainty an enhanced risk is what they go with (just an example, not the case in this forecast). Likewise the forecast may hinge on one or more ingredients in the atmosphere that have to be present in the right amount at the right time and if not then storms may not be as severe as they might have been. Often just a few hours difference in timing or a weather feature being a few hundred miles in the wrong place makes a big impact on the actual weather.

getting back to 2/16, I would have expected more coverage of severe reports especially in the enhanced region. Most of the tornado reports occurred in the highest probably area (not shown) which was good but wind damage reports were expected to be more widespread.

Next we'll look at 3/1/2023 (original post here). I think this forecast verified well enough but most of the tornado and damaging wind reports were isolated to a fairly small area or scattered respectively. The 5% tornado and 15% damaging wind risk areas stretched well back to the west in the slight risk area and you can see the few tornados that were reported were in the east part of the area and the damaging wind reports were mostly scattered with a cluster in the east.

The last event I need to catch up on is for 3/2/2023 through 3/3/2023 (original post here). Looking at the verification for the forecast issued the morning of the 2nd you can see that the forecast verified quite well in the core threat area. I think the lack of reports in the eastern part of the risk area was mainly due to the storm system not moving to the east as quickly as originally thought as you can see when you compare the two days. It is also interesting that very few tornadoes formed across Mississippi and middle Tennessee where there were 10% tornado risk areas (not shown). The slower moving system also messed up the part of my forecast where I stated that the weather would be out of our area by noon at the latest when in fact it didn't clear until the evening.

That's it for this post. I like to always take a look at how these forecasts worked out and provide that for those that are interested. It looks like severe weather is possible on Sunday the 12th so keep an eye out for a post on that.

Severe Weather Possible Late Tonight through Tomorrow Morning

March 2, 2023

The possibility for severe weather continues overnight tonight and into Friday, this time for a larger portion of the Southeast. The Day 1 Outlook (valid until 7 a.m. tomorrow) shows the severe weather risk to our west. This system will move into our area in the late evening to early morning hours bringing with it a Slight to Marginal risk for severe weather. Some hail will be possible for portions of Alabama tonight (see Day 1), otherwise the main threats are isolated tornadoes (mostly away from the coast) and damaging winds. Timing and threats vary by region so take a look at the graphics for your area for more details.

Day 1 Outlook (7 a.m. today through 7 a.m. Friday)

Day 2 Outlook (7 a.m. Friday through 7 a.m. Saturday)

Huntsville Area

Birmingham Area

Mobile-Pensacola-Destin

Santa Rosa Beach-Panama City and Surrounding Areas

The rain and storms should clear the eastern portion of our area by noon Friday if not before and after that we should have a nice weekend. Rain chances will increase again starting Monday (mostly towards the coast, low chance this day) with areal coverage increasing through Thursday.

Stay safe and have a good weekend.

Chris

Severe Weather Possible Today for Northern AL and TN

March 1, 2023

After having a break for about two weeks severe weather is again in the forecast today. The SPC is forecasting a Slight (yellow) risk of severe weather for parts of northern and northwestern Alabama and the southern portion of central to western Tennessee with a marginal (dark green) risk extending south towards Birmingham and north and east to cover most of the rest of Tennessee. Isolated tornadoes, damaging winds, and hail are all possible with the greater risk of each being in the Slight risk area. Timing graphics are shown for each major area. For the central Alabama area there will be isolated/scattered storms approaching from the south-southwest earlier in the day today followed by squall line storms approaching from the west in the evening and overnight.

Huntsville Area

Birmingham Area

Expect active weather through the rest of the week with another round of severe storms starting early Friday with more extensive coverage across the Southeast (I'll have more on this tomorrow).

Stay aware of changing conditions for your area and have multiple ways of receiving alerts, especially for the overnight storms.

Stay safe.

Chris