Spring-time Day on Tap

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

It's hard to get a better day than what is in store for Central Alabama today. It will be warm and dry as aftternoon highs reach the middle 80s, about 10 degrees above normal for this time of year. Morning lows were very pleasant as most locations dropped into the 50s with some isolated 40s in those cooler locations. Soil moisture is rather high so there were some reports of patchy fog. Dew was quite heavy in my area when I went out to get the newspaper. Of course, I had little help as Dakota, my dog, watched me stroll out to the street from her perch on the front porch.

The good weather continues into the start of the work week with some high clouds zipping through the sky. That changes on Tuesday as clouds increase ahead of an approaching cold front. With that cold front comes a slight risk of severe weather across a sizeable portion of Alabama, western Georgia, southern Mississippi, southern Louisiana, and southeastern Texas.

The front should move through the area Tuesday evening with improving weather forecast for Wednesday as the front gets into the northern Gulf of Mexico and begins to wash out.

After that, the area will come under a strengthening northwesterly flow pattern as a long wave trough sets up along the east coast of the US. This should drop us back a few degrees to values that will be close to normal for the latter part of April. We could see lows into the 40s on Thursday and Friday mornings.

The northwesterly flow pattern will see a strong short wave move out of central Canada toward Saturday, so we'll need to monitor the forecast guidance to see what impact that might have on the forecast. But that is about a week away, and a lot can change when you get that far out into the future.

The video also includes a couple of images of Tropical Cyclone Monica which will be affecting the northern coast of Australia over the next several days. Kind of a reminder that our own hurricane season is a little over a month away. Bill Murray has some good information on Monica posted below.

Once again, I'd like to extend my thanks to the folks at the Hollis Fire Department for the invitation to their community awareness day yesterday. Jason and I had a great time. We both love getting out and talking with viewers. I've posted some pictures of the event and our trip on a post below.

Hope you have a good week. Stay weather wise and be safe.

-Brian-