450,000 customers without power.

Some power was restored today but early tonight, these outages:

260,000 in Upstate South carolina
113,000 in West and Central North Carolina
55,000 in Northeast Georgia
34,700 in the Atlanta Metro Area

A fatality near Charlotte today. A 100-foot tall tree fell because of the ice load and killed a man in his living room resting on a couch.

Above information from the Associated Press

The Thursday afternoon map discussion video is on the server:

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

Scroll down the the latest on AL, the massive snow and ice storm impacting much of the eastern U.S. J.B. as always has done a great job keeping tabs on the system. And, see those rain totals for Alabama. A very good soaking as advertised.

By the way, I named the trio of storms that faced Alabama back on Tuesday morning when I was working with little sleep. AL, BOB, and HOPE.

BOB: I don't see much reason to change our weekend outlook. Bob will bring mostly a cold rain to the state, but there is a chance of wintry mix on the northern edge of the big precipitation shield. Best chance of ice pellets or snow flakes north of U.S. 278, but temperatures should be hovering a tad above freezing which should prevent serious travel problems.

We will have to watch for unexpected issues from evaporative cooling and dynamic cooling, but for now we just don't think Bob will bring any big problems to the state.

For those of you traveling this weekend, Bob won't be a big, bad ice storm like Al. There could be a few flurries over Tennessee, but again travel problems look unlikely with most of the precipitation remaining over Alabama and Georgia. And, instead of rolling up the Atlantic seaboard, for now it looks like Bob will move out to sea and not really impact the major eastern U.S. cities.

Of course, all of this could change as we get closer to the weekend, so stay tuned...

HOPE: Again, this continues to be the most interesting system ahead. The latest run of the GFS shows a strong short wave trough moving through the midwest, with a second short wave hanging back over the southwest U.S. This run does not phase the two waves. The idea of a winter storm threat for parts of the deep south is based on a phased storm system...

So, for the moment we discount the 12Z GFS and still expect phasing next week with the potential for a mid-week storm with rain and possibly winter precipitation across the deep south. CPC continues to also think along these lines for next week on their afternoon update today.

If by chance the GFS is correct, the lead wave over the midwest might bring some flurries to north Alabama Monday night, and then the second wave brings rain toward the end of the week as warmer air returns. Again, we discount this solution for now based on the pattern.

LONG RANGE: If we do have a phased system next week, there will be a shot of cold air Wednesday through Friday, followed by moderating temperatures by Christmas day.

The next map discussion video will be on the server by 7:00 a.m. tomorrow!

GREAT SMOKY MOUNTAINS
No snow on the ground this morning at Gatlinburg or Cades Cove but they may have some by now. There was 8 inches on the ground in the high country at Newfound Gap and 9 inches atop 6400-foot Mount Leconte.

MID-DAY UPDATE FROM THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Freezing rain and ice jolted the South on Thursday, closing schools, snarling traffic and knocking out power to about 300,000 customers from Atlanta to Charlotte, N.C.

The outages were caused by ice, up to half an inch thick, that formed on tree limbs and fell onto power lines. About 190,000 were reported without power in western North Carolina and South Carolina's upstate, 57,000 in the Atlanta area and nearly 50,000 across parts of northeast Georgia.

Ten school systems were closed in Georgia and more than a dozen closed in North Carolina, where mountain communities in the western part of the state were told to expect 1 to 3 inches of snow and sleet.

The weather also caused delays of more than an hour at Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport.

A most unpleasant day to put it mildly (or should I say "coldly?"

GAINESVILLE GEORGIA
That is in Hall County in NE Georgia.
Estimated 400 trees down from the ice load
Ice load at least 1/4 inch
That does not sound like much but it creates tree-crashing weight
8 to 10 roads closed at one time but open now

HOMER GEORGIA
At one time early today, the city of Homer, in Banks County had no power with ice on many roads.

EASTERN SPOT REPORTS AT NOON EST
Washington National Airport...29, light snow
Quantico, Va...30, light sleet
Leesburg, Va.,...27 light snow
Richmond...36 light rain
Charlottsville, Va...27 freezing rain
Raleigh-Durham 39 light rain
Hot Springs, Va...heavy snow, visibility only 1/4 mile
Baltimore...28 light snow
Annapolis 30 ;ight snow
Greensboro and Charlotte...32 freezing rain
Asheville...32 mixed precipitation
Jefferson, N.C...32 light snow
Greer, S.C...32 freezing rain

This is a very serious situation in the ice storm that is now underway in the Mid Atlantic States. Some specific reports:

GEORGIA
An ice load of 1/4 inch has already built up in the Bowman, Clarksville, Clayton areas of NE Georgia. This includes the counties of Elbert, Habersham and Raybun. Power is out and trees are down all across those areas.

SOUTH CAROLINA
Lots of trees down in Oconne County.
In Spartanburg County, power is out and trees down, including city of Spartanburg
In Union County, numerous trees have fallen under the ice load

NORTH CAROLINA
1/4 inch ice load has built over a wide area
1/2 inch ice load in Henderson County
3/4 inch ice load in Polk County (that is major
Many accidents on the icy roads in Avery County
Power outages and trees down around Asheville
in Charlotte, two interstate highways already closed

At Charleston, this interesting non-ice story. Two and one-half feet of Folly Beach has eroded after the high tide earlier today.

Remember: Scan down for a lot more current and valid information.

Surely this overnight rain is the most widespread general soaking in Alabama in many months. I can almost guarantee that not a single square inch of the state escaped getting wet overnight. From almost every county, the rainfall amounts were very impressive. Let's run down a list:

0.73 at Anniston Airport
1.23 at Birmingham Airport
1.41 at Shelby County Airport (NWS Office)
1.40 at Decatur
1.67 in Huntsville
2.09 in Mobile
2.50 in Clay (near Jefferson-St. Clair County line)
1.32 in Helena (Brian Peters' station)
0.97 in Greystone Cove (James Spann)
1.72 in NE Trussville (where Little Miss Molly lives)
0.84 at ABC 33/40, Riverchase (just since midnight)
0.82 in Montgomery
2.17 in Muscle Shoals
1.50 at Tuscaloosa Airport
1.20 in Selma
1.15 in Cullman
1.80 in Huntsville (UAH)
1.66 at Smith Dam
1.98 at Blue Pond (Cherokee County)
1.66 at Blountsville
1.54 at Bankhead Lock and Dam
1.55 at Blount Springs
1.35 in Cordova
1.12 in Carbon Hill
1.54 in Gaylesville
1.70 in Jasper
1.37 in Oneonta
1.40 in Steele

NOTE: This is going to be one of those days where we will be entering a lot of weather information on the blog, so it is important to remember to scroll down for a lot more entries that still have current and useful information.

NOTE: I just edited this post and changed all the "icestorm" words to "ice storm." Would someone tell me why ice storm is two words while snowstorm and thunderstorm are singlular words? I wish Mr. Webster would let me rewrite the dictionary.

It is going to affect a wide area, but for this post we discuss mainly Extreme NE Georgia and the Carolinas where an ice load of 2/10ths to 4/10th ice load could form.

An Ice Storm Warning continues today for:

Extreme NE Georgia
Upstate South Carolina
Southern Foothills and Piedmont of North Carolina

Hardest hit will be the Carolinas, especially North Carolina.

An ice load of 1/2 inch may be common along and north of Interstate 40 from Asheville to Hickory and eastward. If this happens, numerous trees will come crashing down from the heavy weight of the ice. Widespread power outages will occur that may last for days.

Travel in those areas highly discouraged.

SPOT REPORTS AT 9 AM EST
Atlanta...34, light rain (They had freezing rain earlier)
Athens...32, freezing rain
Augusta...36, cloudy
Greenville, S.C.,...32, freezing rain
Anderson, S.C.,...32 freezing rain
Columbia...34 rain

NORTH CAROLINA
Asheville...31, freezing rain
Jefferson...27 snow
Hickory...31, freezing rain
Charlotte...32, freezing rain
Greensboro...29, freezing rain
Winston-Salem...30, freezing rain
Raleigh-Durham...34, rain

VIRGINIA
Richmond...31, light snow
Charlottsville...25, light snow
Lynchburg...25, freezing rain
Roanoke...24, snow

Virginia and other areas will also be impacted by this storm. More information to follow including some specific reports on what has happened.

Our friends at CPC seem to be catching on to the idea of Bob and Hope:



Note the potential for wintry precipitation highlighted here across north-central Alabama from Bob (Saturday night), and Hope (next Tuesday or Wednesday).

Still plenty of uncertainty in the details of both systems. And, I guess there is still some chance instead of seperate waves they can phase up as one (Bob Hope for early next week. Just an outside chance.

Much more later...

The Thursday morning map discussion video is on the server:

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

Al (we named these storms several days ago... scroll down to Tuesday morning's post) will be long remembered for our friends northeast of here... as a major ice storm. This thing looks really bad. One of our radio affiliates is in Lynchburg, VA... I just checked their observation, and it shows 25 with a soaking rain falling. This will bring down thousands and thousands of trees, and power outages will be widespread from north Georgia all the way up to Pennsylvania.

Atlanta has been hovering around 32 during the night... seems like the roads are mostly wet in the city, although GA 400 has some ice on the approach to I-285.

Here in Alabama... there has been some icing up on Lookout Mountain around Mentone. See J.B.'s report below this one. The wedge almost got us... it was a very close call for northeast Alabama.

J.B. will run down rain totals here as the day rolls on... at my place in northern Shelby county the storm total as of 6:00 a.m. is 0.84".

The rain will continue to exit the state this morning, and tomorrow will be brigher day with temperatures moving up into the low 50s by afternoon.

BOB: Tricky little system coming in here over the weekend. The GFS suggests a cold rain for the southern two-thirds of the state, with little chance of any wintry precipitation. But, the GFS has been rotten in thermal fields all month; you have to use it with caution. The GFS had no clue... and I mean no clue... several days ago over this ice storm northeast of here today.

The NAM... does come in a little colder and has the precipitation shield up into Tennessee. If you believe this model, there indeed could be a wintry mix Saturday night over north Alabama, mainly north of U.S. 278 (north of a line from Hamilton to Cullman to Gadsden). The freeze line at 850 is at Birmingham, but many of the other critical partial thickness values are closer to Huntsville.

We won't change much in the forecast for now; we will mention a cold rain for most of the state, with that chance of sleet or snow involved north of U.S. 278 for Saturday night. Most of the precipitation will come from about 4:00 p.m. Saturday through 6:00 a.m. Sunday. Surface temperatures should remain a little above freezing over north Alabama, so at this point major travel problems are not expected.

Of course, we will fine tune this forecast in coming days.

HOPE: The final storm of the trio comes in here toward the middle of next week... perhaps Tuesday night or Wednesday. The GFS shows a very dynamic upper system, but we think the surface features are displaced too far to the south and east.

Based on teleconnections, and the pattern that is spinning up these Gulf storms, it makes more sense for the main surface low to be much closer to the coast than what you see on the GFS. And, if this thinking is correct, there will be a winter storm threat for SOME part of the deep south, or southeast U.S. toward the middle of next week. Once again, I don't know exactly where. We have to get Al and Bob out of here and then we can focus on the details of Hope.

Next week looks cold. The GFS MOS temperatures are laughable.

BEYOND HOPE: I think temperatures will moderate here after Hope... that is the last storm in the series. The westerlies move north, and temperatures will moderate for a while around Christmas, continuing into the following week.

J.B. will keep a running dairy of events up to the northeast today... I will have the next map discussion video posted to the server by 3:30 this afternoon. One thing is for sure... no dull days around here for the next week!

Rain now tapering off over West Alabama.
Steady rain over much of the rest of the state
Temperatures have warmed a few degrees over the extreme east such as the Anniston area

Earlier this morning, Vic Bell, the 3340 weather watcher for Black Creek was reporting 33 with a wintry mix and the ground crunchy with ice. Black Creek is in Northeast Etowah County some 12 miles northeast of Gadsden.

SPOT REPORTS AT 4 AM
Birmingham...45 with rain, gusty SE winds
Tuscaloosa...48 heavy rain
Huntsville...38 rain
Anniston...41 light rain
Fort Payne Airport...36 rain
Anniston...35 at 1201 feet ele., several degrees warmer than at midnight
Mt. Cheaha...36, several degrees warmer
Mentone...32 at elevation of 1765 feet

NOT SO GOOD EAST OF ALABAMA
Ice Storm Warning for Extreme NE Georgia
Ice Storm Warning for Upstate South Carolina
Ice StormWarning for Western North Carolina + Foothills
Freezing rain Advisory for rest of North Georgia, including Atlanta
Travel highly discouraged in the Ice Storm Warning Area
Damage to trees and powerlines expected
Travel will become very hazardous

SPOT REPORTS FROM THOSE AREAS AT 5 AM EST
Atlanta...32 with freezing rain
Chamblee, Ga.,...33 freezing rain
Gainesville, Ga.,...31 freezing rain
Raleigh-Durham...30 freezing rain
Asheville, N.C.,...28 freezing rain
Jefferson, N.C.,...21 light snow
Hickory, N.C.,...29 freezing rain
Charlotte...30 freezing rain
Greensboro...27 freezing rain

Look for a complete discussion from James Spann posted here by around 6 am CST.