12/30 - 8pm - Anyone Up for a Third Round of Wintry Weather?

With two winter weather events within a week's time in the books for Kentuckiana, it's apparently time for a third! Unfortunately the timing for this one is pretty bad. Just as folks are going home from New Year's parties in the early hours of Tuesday morning we could have snow, sleet, or even freezing rain falling in the region. The good news here is that regardless of what falls from the sky, there won't be much of it. Precipitation amounts will remain light since heavy rain and storms in the South will be stealing our moisture here up north in Kentucky and Indiana during the time of the event. As far as timing goes, a few snow showers will move through tomorrow afternoon as this system begins to move toward us. Going into the evening is when things get tricky.

As a weak area of low pressure continues to approach we'll see some warming aloft out ahead of it. This warming has the potential to turn our falling snow into sleet or even freezing rain. The GFS is leading the charge at the moment on the potential for freezing rain in Louisville as it has a layer above freezing from 4,000 to 7,000 feet at 4am on Tuesday morning that would support freezing rain. The NAM model keeps us all snow with the entire atmosphere being below freezing. Given that the models have overestimated temperatures aloft with the past two snowstorms we've seen lately, I'm inclined to think that Louisville will stay mostly or all snow. Another thing to focus on will be surface temperatures. Should they be just below freezing this snow, sleet, or freezing rain will stick to the roads and make for tricky travel on late Monday night. If they're just above freezing then only expect to see accumulation on the grass and elevated surfaces. We do have a bit of snowcover in Louisville now, so that might lean us more in the direction of below freezing instead of above for this event overnight Monday into Tuesday. We're going to be awfully close to freezing for much of the night regardless. Areas north of the city will likely stay all snow and below freezing while those areas to the south will see a wintry mix and temperatures just above freezing until the early morning hours. National Weather Service offices across the Plains have issued Winter Weather Advisories due to this system, in purple on the image to the left, but uncertainty about precipitation type and amounts in the Ohio Valley has NWS Louisville waiting for more agreement before they issue any advisories.

Like I said before, accumulations are going to be light for this event. The NAM (right) has up to an inch of snow in many areas and the GFS model has been a little more optimistic at times today with 1-3" across the area. Like the last two snow events, I'm thinking that the amount of precipitation being put out on the models will adjust upward a bit as we get closer to time (tonight and tomorrow morning). Given the trends I'm seeing right now I think we'll see 1-2" of snow in portions of Louisville and points northward with up to an inch of snow and mixed precipitation to the south. Once again... grumble grumble grumble... Louisville is right on the line between feast and famine with the snow. Southern Indiana has been the big winner with snow over the past week while folks south of the Ohio River are raising their hands in favor of more. That is, if you're a snow lover of course. So, we'll be looking to see over the next few hours how the models handle the amount of precipitation forecast, and temperatures both aloft and at the surface. Shifts in these could mean some significant changes to the forecast for many areas!

12/21 - 2pm - I'm Dreaming of a White (Day After) Christmas

How about that snow last night around Kentuckiana? Most places saw a dusting but areas in Southern Indiana near Orange County picked up about 3 inches since a snow band set up there for a few hours during the overnight. Here at my house in Southeast Louisville we picked up a dusting of snow that blew around a bit in the wind. Temperatures today aren't going to make it out of the mid 30's in Louisville today thanks to the cold air behind the front that passed through yesterday. Seems appropriate given that it's the first day of winter!

Temperatures will moderate for the weekend with southerly flow returning but an area of low pressure moving through will bring rain and even warmer temperatures for Christmas Eve. Booooo! Luckily Christmas Day isn't looking like a washout with just a few clouds and highs in the lower 40's. That's a different story further South in Mississippi, Alabama, and Georgia where rain will be setting up.

Now... onto the fun part. Over the past couple of days the forecast models have been jumping onto the idea of an area of low pressure moving from the Gulf states to the western side of the Appalachian Mountains the day after Christmas. This is concerning because this track favors a snow event for Kentuckiana and even some of West Tennessee. You need to be on the north and west side of these low pressure systems if you want to see some snow since that's where the cold air is confined to. The past few systems we've been on the south and east sides of the lows moving though so that has meant thunderstorms and warm weather lately.

The latest 3 runs of the GFS for this particular post-Christmas storm have been fairly consistent with the low track, which is good! The problem has been that there's been trouble determining how much cold air there will be to work with and how strong/large the low moving through will be. These issues have affected how much snow the Louisville area gets. The graphic on the left is a comparison of the last 3 runs of the GFS for December 26th. For entertainment purposes only, the 0z run had just shy of 8" of snow for Louisville, the 6z had about 3", and the 12z had around 2.5". It is still way, way too far out for specific totals and to worry about the cold air issues yet since things will change likely on the models between now and then. I will say though that the 6 and 12z runs seemed to have difficulty keeping the low as a single, compact system once it matured and instead wanted to go with an elongated large low that tries to interact with another low that develops east of the Appalachians. I've seen this kind of thing happen on the GFS earlier this year with the Nor'easters that we had. Eventually, based on what happened with these Nor'easters, these elongated lows should give way to more concentrated, compact lows on the GFS as we get closer to the actual event. This should help to clear up some of the murkiness with the cold air issues too.

The Euro has been fairly consistent with the track of the low as the GFS has been, but has also experienced a few issues of its own like the GFS. Yesterday's 12z run of the Euro had a blockbuster snow event in the Louisville area while the 0z last night backed off on that prospect thanks to, you guessed it, a more elongated low and trouble with cold air. I can't post the precipitation output from the Euro model since it's behind a paywall and copyrighted, but I can at least show you what the 0z run did with the low after it moved through. Lots and lots of cold air will be behind this system if you couldn't tell by the deep blues and purples on the map!

UPDATE 2:20pm - Today's 12z Euro model run is in and it has a blockbuster storm track for snow for us here in Kentuckiana and West Tennessee. That is quite a strong low in East Tennessee on the left-hand map compared to previous runs. Sheesh.

The CMC and the JMA, which are the Canadian and Japanese models, aren't worth showing here right now. The CMC has the storm running off the east coast and the JMA has a nice low track for some snow in Louisville. It's worth noting that this system might disappear all together on the models or make a radical change. It's still too far out for much certainty.

Also, West Tennessee may see snow from this storm should it take the track that we're seeing. It wouldn't be much snow but certainly more than an inch or so isn't out of the realm of possibility, especially in Northwest Tennessee. Once we get closer to time this will become a bit more clear.

The NAO, which is the North Atlantic Oscillation, frankly isn't agreeing that there will be support for this storm. A negative NAO means blocking near Greenland allows for cold air to flow into the Eastern US and stay locked in place. The current forecast is for a positive NAO during this time, but it has been flipping between negative and positive over the past couple of days. This storm doesn't have to have a negative NAO to happen, but it would help to have it for cold air support and for a storm track that rolls up to the northeast. This will, like the aforementioned models, sort itself out over the next few days.

 

Finally, NWS Louisville has been on board with this storm since yesterday. They're being cautious like they should be but mentioning at length the potential for this at 5 days out is something that they don't do very often. Here's their latest statement:

A much more significant weather system will arrive on the 26th. Both the 00z GFS/ECM and ensembles track a strong low pressure system just to the west of the Appalachian spine which may set us up for our first significant snow. If the low pressure system takes its current forecast track, precipitation would enter the area Wed morning with the bulk of precip occurring Wed during the day and then exiting late Wed night or Thurs morning.

Although there is still much uncertainty in the track of this weather system 6 days out, the possibility is there for significant snow based on the low track and anticipated thermal profiles. BUFKIT GFS showed 8 inches at SDF with a little more than 0.5 inch of qpf. The soundings denote a classic heavy snow sounding with subzero and deep isothermal layer super saturated. The synoptic features of interest are a 110 kt jet max entering a the base of a deepening trough.

For now will have 60% pops on the 26th with rain in the morning and then snow in the afternoon and Wed night. Bing Crosby`s I`m dreaming of a White Christmas may happen, just 24 hours later.

Stay tuned for upcoming forecast updates as this weather system may put a kink in holiday travel plans.

 

This will be a fun system to watch over the weekend. Hopefully there's some snow in our future!

 

12/11 - 10:30pm - Be Careful When Wishing for Snow... You Might Get it!

With all the warmth much of the eastern portion of the nation has been experiencing lately some folks are beginning to get antsy over whether we'll be able to fall into a more winter-like pattern in time for the holidays. The cold front that rolled through earlier this week has helped to assuage some of those fears as it brought much cooler temperatures and even some light snow/sleet to parts of Kentucky and Indiana.

So... What's next? First up is a system that will move through the region this weekend as a warm one. A low will travel from the Plains to Lake Michigan and keep the eastern half of the nation warm as it spreads rain from the Great Lakes to the South. This makes sense because the North Atlantic Oscillation (NAO) will be going neutral during this time, which generally means that cold air won't be able to spill down into the Eastern US from Canada. The Arctic Oscillation will be negative to support cold air coming out of the north, but that doesn't matter too much for us when the NAO isn't negative as well.

The system behind this weekend's is the one that is drawing some concern. A low will be moving across the South during the day on Tuesday and potentially spread some snow to areas that are north of it. At this point anywhere from West Tennessee to the Louisville area is in a potential corridor for snow. This all depends on the exact track of the low and how much cold air it will be able to bring down from the north. This scenario is supported by the NAO and AO both going negative during this time. The GFS model takes the storm along the southern border of Tennessee right to the Carolinas. The ECMWF (European) model starts out with the low a little further south along the Mississippi River but has it exit off the coast in about the same location as the GFS. The low would then become a storm that would ride up to the Northeast just off the coast. With the previous system pulling up toward the Chicago area, this low will likely stay suppressed to the south. So... the broad, general nature of this low's track isn't in too much question. My preliminary (read: subject to change!) thinking is that this will be a rain to light snow situation for portions of Tennessee and Kentucky since cold air would plunge in as the system is exiting to the east. Accumulations would be very light to none.

But here's an issue. The snow cover over the Northern Plains and Upper Midwest has expanded tremendously over the past week as a storm pummeled those areas with quite a bit of snow. We're now at 31.4% snow cover over the United States. Air moving from the north over that snow won't warm as quickly as it would over bare land and the computer models generally have a difficult time resolving that. With this snow cover, the air in place over us and the air coming down from the north may be a little cooler than the computer models think it will be at the moment. That could mean more snow from this system. We're still a week away from this event so while details are sketchy, it's now obvious that this is a system to watch. This likely won't be the only storm we'll have to contend with between now and the new year since a pattern is setting up that will allow cold air to sit close by to the Ohio and Tennessee Valleys while lows track through and just to the south of the region. There's hope for a white Christmas in the region but it will depend on whether we can get enough cold air and a storm to move through just before the 25th. It'll be fun to watch!

9/24 - 2pm - Ringing in Fall with Great Weather!

What a great day outside it is here at Mississippi State! We're still in the lower 70's at this hour and the dewpoint is staying low in the mid 40's too. This translates to a beautiful day with low humidity that's not terribly characteristic of September in Mississippi. Nevertheless, what great weather to ring in the first week of fall! Sunny skies will continue throughout most of the workweek but temperatures will rise through the 80's as we move forward. This change in temperature, and unfortunately an increase in humidity, will be due to a more southerly wind component coming into play that will bring us more moist air from the south. It's not looking like we'll hit 90 this week for a high at any point, but we could get close to it. A system pulling through by the weekend will increase our shower and storm chances a little bit by that point but it's not entirely clear when the best chances will be at this point. Check out my CampusConnect forecast below for all the details!

9/10 - 4pm - Cooler Weather to Stick Around!

The break in the heat across North Mississippi has made it hard to go back to work and school today but at least it's sticking around for awhile! 90 degrees is not in the forecast for Starkville and the Golden Triangle for the foreseeable future. What we do have in the forecast is sunny skies and temperatures only nudging into the upper 80's over the next couple of days. By the time we hit the weekend we'll increase shower chances a little bit since more moisture will be flowing in with more southerly winds, but it doesn't look like an all-day washout. A reinforcing shot of cool air could make it as far south as Starkville by the start of next week. Your latest detailed CampusConnect forecast is just a click away in the video below!

7/15 - 7pm CDT - The Heat Returns!

A few showers are ongoing across West Tennnessee right now, but this is quite a bit less than what was expected today. Dry air rotating around a area of high pressure has moved into the region because this high has nudged a bit further westward than originally forecast. This means that a majority of the shower activity has stayed west of the Mississippi River, but a couple thundershowers could still pop up before sunset. These should mostly dissipate before the overnight hours.

Heat and humidity are on their way back as a large ridge of high pressure moves eastward over the next few days. This should surpress storm chances a little bit, but not entirely because temperatures aloft will still be a little cool. This heat at the surface and the slightly cool air aloft should create the typical "summertime pop-up storm" environment that we're used to seeing in the afternoons this time of year. Temperatures underneath this ridge of high pressure should be in the lower to middle 90's in West Tenneessee and middle 90's until Wednesday in Kentuckiana. A front dropping south on Thursday will trigger higher rain chances in both Kentuckiana and West Tenneessee and there could be some slightly cooler temperatures behind the front for Kentuckiana. Things look to remain hot all week long in West Tennessee!

I'm in Jackson, TN right now getting ready for the 10 O'Clock news on WBBJ this evening before going back to Louisville tomorrow. Check out my Hokey Weather Fact from last night's show on the left and be sure to tune in to WBBJ tonight at 10 for a new one!

 

7/10 - 3:30pm - Heat Advisories and Warnings

The hottest days of summer are yet to come, with today and tomorrow being just the start. A ridge of high pressure has locked itself into the eastern half of the nation, and many are feeling its hot and humid effects. It's 91° at Louisville International Airport, 88° in the southeastern suburbs of Louisville, 91° in Bowling Green, KY,  and 95° in Jackson, TN as of 3pm EDT/2pm CDT. Doesn't take me to tell you that those are some hot readings! Areas near the Louisville area have been placed under a Heat Advisory until 8pm tomorrow while areas to the west of Owensboro have been placed under a more strongly-worded Excessive Heat Warning. Highs in Louisville could reach near 96° tomorrow with heat indices ("feels like" temperatures) up to 110.

Most of West Tennessee is under an Excessive Heat Warning until tomorrow at 10pm. Jackson could get up to 100 tomorrow with Memphis easily passing into the triple digits. Heat indices near or above 110 are expected, so limit your time outside if possible and drink lots of water.

As a trough and associated "cool" front dip down from the north, we should see chances for storms enter the forecast by Tuesday, which will help to break the heat a bit. While more scattered in Tennessee, Kentucky will likely see a good helping of storms during Tuesday afternoon and evening, some of which may be strong. The Storm Prediction Center has placed portions of Kentucky (including the Louisville area) under a Slight Risk for severe storms. I don't think there will be much, if any, of a tornado and hail threat from these, but gusty winds could present some issues across the region.

7/8 - 3:30pm - Here Comes the Sun!

It's been a rainy one around Louisville today. The airport has had .45", my house in Southeast Louisville received .88", and Shelbyville got .72" of rain since midnight. Bullitt, Hardin, and Meade Counties in Kentucky all received well over an inch of rain, but Frankfort is the winner coming in at 2.13" since midnight. Check out some of the rain amounts since midnight in the map below from the Kentucky Mesonet. The clouds are still hanging around just east of Louisville, but Louisville and westward is seeing some sunshine. That trend should continue eastward as the afternoon goes on. There's a chance that some scattered storms could redevelop later today around the area, so a few locations could receive more rain today before the cold front triggering these storms moves south.

Sunshine and warmer temperatures will be the rule this weekend around Kentuckiana. High pressure will keep the clouds out of the picture through Monday and temperatures above 90 degrees are a sure bet until then as well. Monday will likely be the hottest day (low to mid 90's) in the near future before another front approaches the area and increases afternoon storm chances yet again.

6/29 - 11am - Quiet Weather is Back!

After what seemed like an endless parade of storms and severe weather across Kentucky, Indiana, and Tennessee, calmer weather is in place and we'll enjoy the fruits of that for most of this week. High pressure centered just east of the Cincinnati area will provide nearly cloudless skies and a rain-free forecast until the weekend. Sounds more like the summertime forecast you were looking for, doesn't it?

We'll also see a break from the humidity, with dew points staying between 45-60 degrees until Saturday. A dew point of 60 is considered to be uncomfortable humidity-wise, so things should stay just below that threshold. Dew points and storm chances, more of the summer-like pop-up variety instead of the spring severe outbreak, will be increasing this weekend and into next week. July 4th looks hot with temperatures in the lower 90's and a slight thunderstorm chance in the afternoon throughout much of the region.

2/1 - 4:30pm - MSU Forecast Video / No Severe Weather Here!

We dodged a bullet here in Starkville today in terms of severe weather. High winds aloft, adequate shear, and optimal low pressure placement all came together today, but a lack of atmospheric instability prevented a severe weather outbreak from occurring across North Mississippi. While they did have some severe storms in South Mississippi, things certainly didn't get out of hand and heavy rain was the only problem across much of the state. We'll clear out the clouds and usher in some cooler temperatures tonight and tomorrow, and maybe even see some light wintry precipitation on Friday. Things will be warmer for the weekend! Check out my MSU weather forecast video below:

10/26 - 5pm - MSU Weathercast / Severe Weather

We're under a Tornado Watch in Starkville until 7pm tonight as a cold front continues to kick up a few severe thunderstorms around North Mississippi. We've been lucky enough to miss the bulk of the severe weather here in Mississippi, but areas in Alabama, Tennessee, and Kentucky have been dealing with wind damage and tornadoes throughout the morning and afternoon today. As this record-breaking low pressure system in Minnesota begins to weaken and move off to the east, weather conditions will improve across much of the East and we'll see the return of sunny skies and cool temperatures here in Mississippi. Check out my latest MSU forecast video below:

8/26 - 9pm - Two Words: High Pressure

If you remember anything about the forecast over the next week, remember this: High pressure will continue to keep things sunny and dry. An area of high pressure hovering near the eastern seaboard will meander around the East and Southeast over the next week, providing us with a continuation of the wonderful weather we've had here in North Mississippi over the past few days. The humid, unpleasant air that influenced our weather last week should stay south of a stationary front over the Gulf Coast. A small surface low associated with that front could produce a small chance of showers here on Friday and Saturday night, but I don't expect anything substantial. The increased moisture that will accompany this rain chance during the weekend will also bring back a small taste of humid air to the area on Saturday, but things should dry back up by Sunday and through next week. Highs will stay in the mid 90's for the next week or so, save for Monday when we'll see a brief cool-down into the mid 80's.

It's been a slow start to the Atlantic hurricane season, but things are now in high gear. We now have Hurricane Danielle, Tropical Storm Earl, and a tropical wave off the coast of Africa that will most likely become Fiona in the coming days. Neither Danielle (which is expected to become a major hurricane) nor Earl will directly impact the United States and should stay out at sea. Earl may get within a few hundred miles of the Outer Banks of North Carolina, but I don't see it getting any closer than that given the high pressure that's expected to be in place at that point in the East US. We'll keep an eye on the disturbed weather that could become Fiona to see where that tracks, but for now the US is in the clear.