Humidity on the Rise...

By Jay Grymes & Steve Caparotta

WAFB Storm Team QuickCast:

- pockets of fog for the morning drive on Wednesday & Thursday
- sun/cloud mix and breezy for Wednesday afternoon
- 20% rain chance for Thursday afternoon
- cold front and rain arrive Friday

It was a decent spring day today but if you spent much time outdoors you probably noticed the increase in humidity compared to yesterday. That trend will continue through the rest of the work week as the low-level flow continues to come off the Gulf.

Staying Breezy & Warm

The added moisture will mean more clouds and a better chance for morning fog over the next couple of days. Highs will stay in the 80°s for Wednesday and Thursday but the “muggies” will set-in for sure -- you’ll likely run the A/C just to pull the moisture out of the indoor air. We can’t rule out a rogue shower or two on Wednesday afternoon and we’ll toss in a 20% rain chance for Thursday afternoon and evening, but both days will stay “mainly dry” for most WAFB neighborhoods.

Good Rain Chances by Friday

By Friday, our next cold front arrives and that means rain likely to close out the work week. Given the weather set-up with the Friday front and given the time of year, we could see some strong-to-severe storms with the frontal passage -- that’s something we’ll need to watch in the coming days.

Unsettled Weather into the Weekend

The front slides through on Friday and heads into the Gulf, but unfortunately both the American GFS and the European ECMWF are currently indicating that the boundary will stall and then retreat northward as a warm front. The timing of this northward retreat differs between the two models right now and that has a big bearing on the Saturday outlook. Both of these extended models keep the first half of Saturday dry but the GFS has decent rain chances returning during the latter half of the day. By comparison, the ECMWF keeps the day relatively rain-free until the evening hours. For the time being we’ll go with a 30% rain chance for Saturday afternoon with those percentages rising into Saturday evening and right through Sunday morning as the warm front lifts into the central Gulf Coast states.

Another disturbance over west Texas will track to the east and northeast into the middle Mississippi Valley from Sunday into Monday, dragging another cold front through the state and keeping rain chances elevated through at least the first half of Monday. The rains should slowly wind down during the second half of Monday and into early Tuesday with clearing skies by Tuesday afternoon.

Temperatures should be cooler during the unsettled run from Saturday into Tuesday, with lows in the 50°s and highs in the 70°s. The NWS Weather Prediction Center is currently indicating most rain totals in the 0.25” to 1.00” range for the WAFB region between now and Friday evening, with substantially larger rains -- on the order 1” to as much as 3” possible -- between Saturday and Monday.