Rains Finally Diminish on Friday

By Jay Grymes & Steve Caparotta

WAFB First Alert Quickcast:

- FLASH FLOOD WATCH continues into Friday
- drier air begins filtering in by Friday afternoon

We’re still not down with the rains! But as we’ve seen the past couple of days, the threat of heavier rains has failed to materialize for most WAFB communities ... at least so far.

We’ve still got “rain likely” in the forecast for tonight and early Friday. Be ready for rain into the Friday morning commute -- and we may even get a few t-storms, although the chance of any severe weather is pretty low. Add in some patchy fog for good measure, and it looks like a messy Friday morning drive. Morning temperatures will be in the low to mid 60°s for the Red Stick.

A FLASH FLOOD WATCH remains in effect until Friday afternoon ... and there is still a potential for as much as 1” to 3” of rain tonight and into the first half of Friday based on our computer guidance models. But we must admit, the models have been running too wet the past few days and we suspect that the trend may continue for tonight and early tomorrow. 

Still we’ve had enough rain to get the area rivers on the rise … and that will need watching in the coming days. A preliminary forecast for the Tangipahoa River at Robert calls for the site to go into flood on Saturday and crest at 1.5 ft above flood stage between Saturday and Sunday. Elsewhere, no other forecast points are currently expected to reach flood, but we’ll keep tabs on the Amite, the Tickfaw and the Natalbany.

And yes, there is light at the end of this “rain” tunnel! 

The rain should be subsiding from west-to-east during the day on Friday, with drier air filtering into the viewing area from the west through the afternoon. We’ll stay under mostly cloudy skies, but the dry-out should be accompanied by mild afternoon temperatures in the low to mid 70°s for most WAFB neighborhoods.

As the drier air (lower dew points) continues to take hold, we can expect cooler morning starts for the weekend: we’re going with lows in the mid 50°s for both Saturday and Sunday. While we can’t say absolutely no chance of rain this weekend, we’ll call it “spotty at best” for both days under a sun/cloud mix with highs in the mid 70°s.

The outlook for next week calls for some more nice spring days: lows in the 50°s and highs in the 70°s. Confidence late in the week is on the low side right now, but we’ll suggest isolated showers for Wednesday with scattered showers and t-storms for Thursday.