Alabama Power crews were out in full force at first light today assessing storm damage from Hurricane Dennis and continuing restoration efforts. As of 5:30 p.m. Monday, 70,529 Alabama Power customers were without power statewide, down from a peak outage of 241,214 at 5:30 a.m. Monday.

Birmingham – Alabama Power President and CEO Charles McCrary today announced the company’s power restoration goals following Hurricane Dennis.

At the height of the outages, 241,214 Alabama Power customers were without power. By 1:30 p.m., 110,138 customers were without power throughout the company’s service territory.

“We did not dodge a bullet, but we did dodge a firing squad,” said McCrary. “This was by no means an insignificant event for Alabama Power or our customers. I appreciate the patience and understanding of people who have been inconvenienced by this storm. Rest assured that our employees will work around the clock to help restore a sense of normalcy to your lives.”

McCrary set a goal for 99 percent restoration according to the following schedule:

*In Birmingham and surrounding areas – restored by end of day Tuesday
*In the Anniston/Gadsden area – restored by end of day Tuesday
*In the Montgomery area – restored by end of day Tuesday (*Clanton, Greenville, Selma sustained more damage and parts of each town could take longer)
*In the Eufaula/Enterprise/Phenix City area – restored by end of day Tuesday
*In the Tuscaloosa area – restored by end of day Tuesday (*Greensboro, Aliceville, Demopolis received more damage and parts of each town could take longer)
*In the Mobile area – restored by end of day Wednesday (*Brewton, Atmore, Monroeville, Flomaton, Thomasville sustained more damage and parts of each town could take longer).

There are 6,700 Alabama Power employees that are doing their jobs to ensure power is restored to customers. An additional 3,500 workers representing 17 states have committed to assist the restoration effort.

Some thoughts after Dennis:

*NHC hits a home run on their forecast track. They called Pensacola FOUR days in advance. Great job in not waffling run to run changes in model output. VERY GOOD JOB.

*Alabama Power gets the service restored to my house after only 12 hours! The linemen at Alabama Power have a thankless job... all they hear are complaints while they are away from their families doing everything they can to get the lights back on for us. VERY GOOD JOB. Yes, I understand there are still many people in the dark as I write this, but your time is coming.

*Our Saturday experiment of long form coverage on our digital channels 33.2 and 40.2 was a big hit. We had some problems getting a clean signal to the Charter cable head end (they carried the coverage on their channel 99 across north and central Alabama), but they was fixed about half way into the show. We were on the air from 6:00 until 9:30 p.m. non-stop on the digital channels, with just periodic updates on our main ABC 33/40 stream. People could get wall to wall weather coverage, or watch regular programming; it is your choice. The future is now; once digital HDTV receivers are in a majority of homes, we will no longer have to worry about cutting off someone's favorite program. Thanks to ABC 33/40 GM Mike Murphy for making this happen this weekend.

*Lots of folks want our long form coverage streamed on the Internet; I am working on that this week.

*Was Dennis a "bust"? No doubt there was not as much inland damage as expected. We can be thankful for the fact that the core of hurricane force winds within Dennis was only about 40 miles at landfall (Ivan's hurricane force winds extended out over 100 miles), and the fact that Dennis literally flew through the coast and the state of Alabama at a forward speed of 20 mph. That really lessened the damage and the rain totals. EVERY hurricane is different.

*This blog was a huge hit during Dennis. We had a total of 71,342 users on Friday, July 8, a new record. The numbers stayed well above 50,000 over the weekend; that means lots of people outside our regular service area are reading. We appreciate it.

*I also thank everyone who watched our coverage on ABC 33/40-TV yesterday and last night. Our ratings peaked at 23.7 rating and a 32 share at 7:45 p.m.... almost DOUBLE the audience of the other local stations combined. We understand we have a very serious responsibility during events like Dennis and we sincerely appreciate your trust.

*On a sad note, please pray for Brenda Ladun and her family; her father died suddenly early yesterday morning.

The Monday afternoon map discussion video is on the server:

http://beta.abc3340.com/weather/video.hrb

I will write some post-Dennis thoughts shortly...

Looking boldly ahead:

AROUND HERE: A vast amount of Gulf and Caribbean moisture will be in place all week as the old circulation of Dennis hangs around the Ohio River to the north. Just about every day this week the sky will be cloudy at times, and we will have to mention scattered to numerous showers and storms. Can't rule out a late night or morning shower in this kind of pure, tropical air.

The showers should thin out a bit late this weekend and early next week as heights begin to rise and the Dennis breathed upper trough begins to fill. Then, a rather strong mid latitude trough north of here will try to push a surface boundary (never use the words "cold front" around here in July toward Alabama's northern border toward the middle of next week, which should bring an increase in the number of showers and storms.

TD5: Should become tropical storm Emily soon, maybe by the time you read this. NHC guidance is on the northern edge of the model suite. I am beginning to think this will be ANOTHER Gulf of Mexico storm. It might keep on trucking west, toward Mexico, or, it could be influenced by the mid-latitude trough next week and try to turn north, up this way. All we can do is wait and watch, but I have fairly high confidence this will be a Gulf of Mexico storm.

HMMMM.. about 500 e-mails in the inbox that need attention, and more blog material to write. Better run for now!

The following information should be used to communicate the latest news from Alabama Power Company:

• Company officials will announce restoration goals early this afternoon.

• Alabama Power crews were out in full force at first light today assessing storm damage from Hurricane Dennis and continuing restoration efforts. As of 10:30 a.m. Monday, 162,418 Alabama Power customers were without power statewide.

• An additional 3,500 workers from 17 states have committed to assist 2,300 Alabama Power employees in restoration efforts.

• Following a full inspection and evaluation of the damage across its service territory, Alabama Power hopes to be able to better estimate restoration times. Assessments will continue today.

• Outages by geographic areas as of 10:30 a.m. are as follows:

• Birmingham Division (including Jefferson and Shelby counties): 44,418

• Western Division (including Marion, Lamar, Fayette, Walker, Pickens, Tuscaloosa, Sumter, Greene, Hale, Bibb and parts of Marengo, Franklin and Winston counties): 21,083

• Eastern Division (including Blount, Etowah, Calhoun, Cleburne, Talladega, Clay, Randolph and parts of Lee, Tallapoosa, Coosa, Chambers and St. Clair counties): 9,170

• Southern Division (including Perry, Dallas, Wilcox, Autauga, Lowndes, Butler, Elmore, Montgomery, Macon, Lee, Bullock, Pike and Crenshaw counties and parts of Chilton County): 45,677

• Mobile Division (including Choctaw, Washington, Mobile, Baldwin, Escambia, Conecuh, Monroe and Clarke counties and parts of Marengo County): 27,883

• Southeast Division (including Covington, Coffee, Geneva, Dale, Barbour, Russell, Henry and Houston counties and parts of Pike, Bullock, Lee and Chambers counties): 14,187

At 10 o'clock this morning, the National Hurricane Center downgraded Tropical Storm Dennis to a tropical depression. Highest sustained winds now down to 30 mph with higher gusts.

At 10 am, Dennis was centered over NE Mississippi 20 miles NW of Tupelo. He was moving NNW at 15.

A few reports of how much rain Dennis dumped on us:

6.27 inches at Camden in Wilcox County
5,28 at West Blocton in Bibb County
4.38 at Samantha, Tuscaloosa County
4.52 at Thomasville
4.21 at Livingston
3.71 at Tuscaloosa
2.12 at Birmingham

Another bit of welcome news. The National Weather Service in Birmingham has cancelled the Flash Flood Watch for the following counties:

AUTAUGA...BARBOUR...BIBB...BLOUNT...BULLOCK...CALHOUN...CHAMBERS.
..
CHEROKEE...CHILTON...CLAY...CLEBURNE...COOSA...DALLAS...ELMORE...

ETOWAH...FAYETTE...GREENE...HALE...JEFFERSON...LAMAR...LEE...
LOWNDES...MACON...MARENGO...MARION...MONTGOMERY...PERRY...PICKENS
...
PIKE...RANDOLPH...RUSSELL...SHELBY...ST CLAIR...SUMTER...TALLADEGA...
TALLAPOOSA...TUSCALOOSA...WALKER...AND WINSTON.

Still groggy from long hours sleepless. Also, babbling quite a bit, but I feel good. I have scheduled 8 hours of sleep for tonight instead of my usual 5 to 6 hours.

Life goes on regardless of amount of sleep

Conditions this morning were improving at Gulf Shores though the wind remained rather blustery with 20 to 30 mph and some higher gusts. It almost seemed to me that Dennis just didn't want to let go of his ifluence on the Alabama coast.

A double sun dog was visible just after sunrise from Gulf Shores looking east. The one to the north was very bright for sun dogs. Sun dogs are small spots of color similar to a rainbow as the sun light travels through high ice crystal clouds (cirrus).

I spoke with a representative of the tourism group at Gulf Shores, and the area will be open to residents with a proper pass today. They expect to open the island to everyone tomorrow morning for anyone with plans to come down here or with reservations.

Special thanks to all of the staff at the Hampton Inn in Foley for their wonderful hospitality to the ABC 3340 team covering Dennis. They just couldn't do enough for us, and we really appreciated having a base of operations.

-Brian-

The circulation center of Dennis was centered over NE Mississippi this morning. But he is still influencing the atmosphere over a wide area.

His broad circulation is still pulling in spiral bands from the Gulf of Mexico.

Wish you could see radar this morning. Some of those spiral bands are forming off the Louisiana Coast and are traveling eastward across the North Gulf of Mexico, curving inland over NW Florida and traveling due north all the way up the west side of Georgia and curving back into Missle Tennessee.

Dennis leaves us with a huge oversupply of deep gulf moisture. When we get some heating today, more thunderstorms will develop and some of those could be severe. Much of North and Central is under a slight risk of severe weather today.

Also, a Flash Flood Watch is in effect. Ground is soft as a sponge so won't take much.

With all the leftover moisture, look for a good chance of showers and storms next few days.

Hope you get caught up on sleep.

Some post-Dennis thoughts...

People along the Alabama coast are thankful that the major threat from Hurricane Dennis did not materialize for the area that was ravaged by Hurricane Ivan last September. Response to the evacuation orders seems to have gone very well. The lane reversal of I-65 seemed to work well. It seems that people remembered Ivan.

I think that NHC five day forecast and graphic is a good thing. It gives business and individuals more time to prepare. But it also raises anxiety levels in people, giving them two extra days to worry about a storm. I thought that the NHC did a great job with this storm. The only problem that I noticed was that sometimes there were delays in getting the public advisories posted to the NHC website. The Hurricane Center was careful not to flip flop back and forth on their forecast track, despite numerous opportunities to do so because of the numerical weather prediction. This consistency is important. Max Mayfield, director of the NHC, placed personal phone calls to Panama City television stations in order to emphasize the threat that Dennis would bring to the Florida Panhandle. It turned out to be very important in emphasizing the threat to places like Destin.

Damage is lighter than one would expect with a Category Three hurricane. Some theories have been advanced that the strong upper level winds could not translate to the surface because of a relative lack of really heavy convection in rain bands. The storm also weakened a bit before landfall, possibly because of cooler water.

The casinos along the Mississippi closed Saturday afternoon. They reopened Sunday afternoon. The Mississippi coast escape major effects from Dennis.

Why are we having so many hurricanes? Quite simple. It’s not global warming. It is a know climatic factor called the Multi-decadal oscillation. Every twenty years or so, the Atlantic warms and the Pacific cools. Twenty years later, it flips. Since 1995 or so, we have been in a warm Atlantic phase. It has corresponded to a period of much above normal Atlantic hurricane activity. I bet we see Phillipe before the 2005 North Atlantic Hurricane Season is over.

Alabama Power Company reported 204,650 power outages as of 11 o'clock tonight.

That pales when compared to last September when Hurricane Ivan devastated the state.During that tragedy there were 800,000 outages.