The surface front is racing through the area ahead of schedule. The severe weather threat is now over.  The rain is over too, for the most part. The weather pattern looks much drier through early next week. Nights will get a little chilly over the weekend with lows near 36 degrees Saturday and Sunday nights.

NWS Meteorologist Jeff Garmon has confirmed this as a wall cloud over downtown Mobile. No tornado was reported… Photo sent in by John Browning.

Tornado Watches are being dropped. We had a couple of warnings earlier with no damage reported. A wall cloud was spotted in downtown Mobile. No funnel actually formed. We had a little hail in Leakesville. The area will see gradual clearing into tonight.

The surface front is stalled offshore, and will organize as a warm front on Wednesday. This feature will move back across the area tomorrow with very little rain. We will see a big increase in temperature and moisture. Daytime highs could easily reach 75 degrees by tomorrow afternoon. The Storm Prediction Center has us targeted for a slight risk of severe weather by Thursday. Things will clear out and turn cooler by Friday and the weekend.

Most of the severe weather occured to our north early today. A number of deadly tornados were reported in central Alabama. The severe threat has lowered quite a bit this afternoon. However, the surface boundary has stalled across the Panhandle and rain and a few storms are still possible. We will continue to see scattered activity across the area over the next few days. Our best chances of rain will be on Thursday.

We expect a chance of storms on Saturday, with a slight risk of severe weather in the inland areas by the afternoon. Typically, cool Gulf water temperatures stabilize the air in our area. This keeps stronger storms north of us for the most part. We have seen the occasional risk of rough weather this year. We are seeing a warmer than average January. Nine days at 70 or above !

Sunday should be quieter, with only isolated rain showers in the forecast.

A surface cold front in central Mississippi is working its way in our direction. Showers and a few t-storms are possible tonight. We expect rainfall amounts near one inch inland, with lighter totals closer to the coast. The rain will end overnight. Cooler weather will arrive with brisk n’west winds on Wednesday. We won’t stay clear for long. Another round of isolated rain is possible by the weekend.

Mostly clear and cold conditions are expected again tonight. The graphic posted here shows the lows for this morning, and we expect similar readings early Saturday. The cold airmass will modify fairly rapidly as we head into the weekend. Temperatures will approach 50 degrees for highs on Saturday. We should be in the mid 60′s by Sunday afternoon.

This graphic shows the best time window of severe weather will be from about mid-afternoon to around midnight.  Gusty winds and even isolated tornadic activity will be possible.