More Wet Weather on Tuesday

By Jay Grymes & Steve Caparotta

WAFB First Alert QuickCast:

- better rain chances for Tuesday

- another July cool front at mid-week

 

Although today’s storms were somewhat limited in areal coverage, a few of them showed goodly amounts of lightning as they bubbled up.  They included a “healthy” thunderstorm that rolled right over downtown Baton Rouge between 3:15-3:45pm, delivering a little rain to our WAFB studio.

 

Yet the majority of WAFB communities stayed dry through Monday afternoon and evening.  However, the WAFB First Alert forecast for Tuesday shapes up to be considerably different. 

 

A July ‘cool’ front continues to sag southward towards the Gulf Coast.  It doesn’t arrive in the WAFB area until very late Tuesday or Wednesday morning, but it will be close enough on Tuesday afternoon to add lift to an already unstable air mass.  The result: our Tuesday afternoon and evening forecast reads “showers and t-storms likely.”  In fact, while we are not expecting a widespread severe weather outbreak, we’ll be on-guard for some strong to isolated severe storms. 

Tuesday’s action should take much of the stormy ‘punch’ out of the air mass as the front sags southward and stalls over the coastal waters by Wednesday afternoon.  That should mean a “drier” feel to the air on Wednesday as a continental air mass makes a brief visit to the viewing area.  Unfortunately, this frontal passage won’t be quite as dramatic as the one we enjoyed over the July 4th holiday weekend.  The air this go-around won’t get quite as cool and it doesn’t look like a complete dry-out either -- we’ll carry 20% to 30% rain chances for Wednesday and Thursday.  What’s more, the front will begin a retreat to the north as a warm front on Thursday.  

 

By Friday, we’ll be back in the “warm sector” (the south side of the front with moist and unstable Gulf air in place), and that will mean a return to increased rain chances.  In fact, we’re calling for 50% to 60% rain chances for Friday, Saturday and Sunday -- so it’s not looking like a very pretty weekend ahead right now.

 

But hey!  Two cool front in the month of July is far from the norm, so let’s enjoy the good fortune for now.  And here’s a bit of more good news: all quiet in the tropical Atlantic and no signs of development potential through the upcoming week.