Weather Update: Thursday – May 2, 2024

WDEF-TV News 12 Weather Forecast

WDEF-TV News 12 Forecast Discussion

The News 12 viewing area finally picked up some relatively decent rainfall early Tuesday morning, with amounts ranging from around a quarter of an inch in the Tennessee Valley, to around 1 to 2 inches on the Cumberland Plateau and across the southern Appalachian mountains. Now that the rain is over, the story shifts to the expected early May mini-heatwave. Computer model guidance indicates that both high and low temperatures will be a good five to ten degrees above normal throughout much of the next several days, as the dominant flow remains southerly, with a brief period of weak northerly, low level flow Wednesday through the morning hours on Thursday. We will have another opportunity for rain at the end of the week. Showers and thunderstorms are modeled to develop over the area Friday and Saturday, ahead of a slow moving, frontal system with help from a couple upper level waves of low pressure. The frontal boundary will push south to near the Coastal Plain in Mississippi, Alabama, and Georgia on Sunday, giving us a brief break in the more widespread pattern of showers and thunderstorms. However, the front will return north with the approach of another upper level trough Sunday night into Monday. The chance for showers and thunderstorms will increase again during this period early next week, as the upper feature shifts east. Following the passage of this third lifting mechanism, we may be able to enjoy a break in the action on Tuesday, as we await yet another upper wave and surface frontal system during the middle of next week. I should emphasize that our weekend period will not be a washout. These weather systems will be progressive, so each feature will bring a few showers and thunderstorms to the area for a period of two or three hours and then, continue east toward the Eastern Seaboard. This period looks similar to what we typically see during the Summer months, when thunderstorms develop in scattered fashion, with slightly greater coverage and intensity during the peak heating of the afternoon, followed by dissipation during the mid to late evening hours, when the surface begins to cool.

Stay tuned to our forecasts throughout the rest of the week, to keep track of any strength or timing changes to our weekend thunderstorm development. We are still not in any significant trouble in terms of annual precipitation. Our annual deficit is around two and a quarter inches after our early week rainfall, but evaporation rates continue to rise as we move further into the warm season. Hopefully we will pick some more rainfall during the “unsettled weekend period” which features a stalled frontal boundary near the WDEF viewing area.

The Climate Prediction Center 8-14 Day Outlook for Wednesday, May 8th – Tuesday, May 14th, features above normal temperatures and above normal precipitation during this period.

National Drought Summary for April 25, 2024

Summary

Moderate to heavy rain amounts fell across parts of the Southeast and Northeast this week, leading to localized improvements to ongoing drought and abnormal dryness in the Southeast, and mostly unchanged conditions in the Northeast, aside from western New York, which missed out on the heavier precipitation and saw minor degradations.

The central third of the contiguous U.S. saw a mix of improvements and degradations, based on where heavier precipitation did or did not fall and where dry and windy conditions continued. Parts of Illinois, Indiana, Ohio, the Michigan Lower Peninsula, southern Missouri and southeast Kansas saw improving conditions after heavier rains fell there. Meanwhile, moderate drought expanded in northwest Missouri and portions of west-central Wisconsin, Minnesota, northwest Iowa, the far southern Michigan Upper Peninsula and far northeast Wisconsin. Much of Texas remained the same, with a few degradations in the southeast corner and several degradations in central and southern Texas where long-term drought conditions are still causing impacts. Recent dryness and warm and windy weather in northwest Oklahoma and the Texas and Oklahoma panhandles led to abnormal dryness developing there.

Short-term dryness and high evaporative demand led to large areas of degrading conditions in northeast Wyoming, while west-central Wyoming, north-central Colorado, northeast Utah, western Montana, and the northern Idaho Panhandle all saw areas of improvement due to lower evaporative demand and improving snowpack recently. In Hawaii, an active trade wind pattern continued, leading to some improvements on the windward (northeast) slopes of the Big Island and Kauai, while a small area of moderate drought developed on the leeward (southwest) portion of Kauai. In Puerto Rico, a few improvements were made where recent rainfall has improved streamflows and crop stress, and lessened rainfall deficits and raised reservoir levels.

No changes were made to the Drought Monitor this week in Alaska.

– NOAA National Centers for Environmental Information

https://droughtmonitor.unl.edu

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