The dates and locations for the ninth annual Storm Alert tour are now finalized. We begin the road tour on Thursday, February 3 at Ashville in St. Clair county (at Ashville High School), and wind up in the Birmingham metro area on Wednesday March 2 at Mountaintop Community Church in Vestavia. Along the way we have other stops in Northport, Hanceville, and Oxford.

I have always wanted to do some kind of weather tour like this, and when I came to ABC 33/40 in 1996 management here loved the idea, and we hit the road in 1997. The crowds have been fantastic, and we have shared many Alabama weather stories and lots of good safety information over the years in an effort to get the public ready for the spring tornado season. We have seen crowds as large as 2,500, and been to dozens of communities across the northern half of Alabama.

This year, we are loaded with great Alabama storm stories. Brian Peters will share his experience with Hurricane Ivan; he visited that major tropical system in a hurricane hunter aircraft over the Gulf of Mexico before landfall, and then he covered it on the ground as it slammed into the Alabama Gulf coast. No doubt that was the big story of the year for Alabama in 2004. Also, see some fascinating video and stories from the November 24 tornado outbreak, when 16 twisters ripped through central Alabama during the early morning hours. Our associate Bill Murray will share pictures and video from his wild day in the southern Plains when he saw seven tornadoes in May 29, 2004. And, we traveled to Holly Pond up in Cullman county to get the real scoop on our new meteorologist, Jason Simpson. Of course, the entire ABC 33/40 weather team will be at each stop and we look forward to seeing you there. All of the shows begin at 7:00, but plan on getting there early for a good seat!

When we have to cover some soap opera for tornado coverage, we know some nasty mail is coming. Here is an interesting one from today:

"Thank you for once again grandstanding for all of us out here who can't do anything about. James Spann needs to really get it through his head when there is ever a weather event this does not give him the right to hold the television programming hostage. It seems to me that we could figure out the people that need all these dire warnings are out in the actual weather not in front of the t.v., so unless they are a proud soap bopper junkie like me they don't have a t.v. attached to them. I've appreciated ABC since I was about 5, but I haven't appreciated this affiliate since they left channel 6. Thank you."

I guess this person figures a tornado would never harm anyone safely inside watching a soap opera!!!!

There were other notes, but too many ugly words to print here. This is a family blog...

The afternoon video update is ready and on the server:

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

Pretty busy morning... thanks for Jason Simpson and Brian Peters for their great work this morning. Seems like there was plenty of wind damage, but most of it was relatively minor. The severe weather threat is over now as rain-cooled, stable air covers the state. Looking up at my thermometer here in Riverchase I see 55 degrees; about 15 degrees cooler than afternoon temperatures of recent days.

I sure get the idea we won't see any more 60s and 70s for a while. The GFS shows a gradual change back to the western ridge/eastern trough configuration over North America, with the coldest temperatures for Alabama centered around January 23-26. This is also when the GFS shows the Arctic Oscillation going strongly negative, so I have an idea it might be pretty cold around here then.

As J.B. has been pointing out, we are seeing some extremely cold air now over northwest Canada and Alaska, and as the western Canada ridge begins to pump, it might capture some of that and drag it down this way in about 9 to 12 days.

See damage reports from this morning here:

http://iwin.nws.noaa.gov/iwin/al/public.html

And, of course, on ABC 33/40 news this evening....

> The Mayor of Haleyville...in a followup report...said that most of the damage in Haleyville earlier this morning was along Highway 13 and along 9th Avenue, North, where some store fronts were blown out and trees and power lines downed. There was no damage in downtown Haleyville. No injuries reported. Haleyville is in extreme Northwest Winston County , some 70 air miles NW of Birmingham.

> Some homes and apartments were damaged in the central part of the city of Tuscaloosa.

> There was also damage in Marion County and some in Lamar County.

> In Mississippi, around 5:30 this morning, trees and power lines down in downtown Jackson and the EMA reports trees and power lines down across Hines County.

> 60 MPH winds and hail 3/4 in diameter at Yazoo City, Miss.

> In West Alabama, wind damage reported in Lamar County between Sulligent and Beaverton along U. S 78. This happened around 7:30 or 7:45 this morning.

The morning video is on the server:

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

This won't be a red letter severe day, but active storms will sweep across the state. Instability values are marginal for severe storms, but wind fields are very strong and helicity is high. Looks now like the main window for severe weather in Alabama will come from about 8:00 this morning to 4:00 this afternoon.

Winds gusted to 60 mph at Yazoo City, MS at 4:52 this morning as the storms passed through.

As I write this a new tornado watch has been posted for parts of west Alabama until 11:00 a.m. See the video for details. And, of course, we will have live coverage on ABC 33/40 as needed during the day today. Time to get strapped in for a busy day...