ABC 33/40 E-Forecast

ABC 33/40 E-FORECAST
Afternoon Edition For Saturday May 30, 2009
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As we get ready to close the books on May, the fifth month of 2009
will go down in Birmingham weather annals as a warm and wet month.
Through the 29th, the mean temperature at the Birmingham International
Airport was 70.8F. The long term climatological average for May in
Birmingham is 69.3F. The average precipitation for May is 4.83 inches.
It looks like we will end the month with 6.26 inches of rain, or about
129% of normal.
NICE WEEKEND: Significant rain has fallen on every weekend day in May
at Birmingham. Today will represent a complete turnaround from that
trend, with sunny skies and no showers expected. Ditto that for
tomorrow. Highs will be in the middle and upper 80s on both days. A
few spots will edge to near or just above 90 degrees tomorrow.

THE WEEK AHEAD: Monday looks like another dry and warm day across
Alabama as high pressure remains in control of our weather. By
Tuesday, a few isolated showers and storms will reappear with the
heating of the afternoon. We will be watching two surface features by
Wednesday. One will be a surface front to our north. It will enhance
our shower and storms chances just a bit on Wednesday and Thursday.
This front will likely push through Central Alabama early on Friday,
shoving the showers and storms to the south. This could also lead to
another nice weekend.

The other surface feature will be a front over the Gulf of Mexico.
That's the sort of thing can spin up an early season tropical cyclone.
No real signs of that in the week ahead, despite the fact that the
front will become a little more active over the relatively warm waters
of the Gulf by midweek. Hurricane season begins in the Atlantic basin
on Monday. Ana, Bill and Claudette will be the first three names up to
bat this year.

AMERICA'S FIRST TORNADO RESEARCHER: John Park Finley of the U.S. Army
Signal Corps was the first bonafide tornado researcher. In 1879, he
was assigned the task of researching tornado events across the Plains
of the United States. One of the tornadoes that he investigated was an
F4 that struck Delphos, KS on this date in 1879. It was one of over a
dozen major tornadoes that day.

A local newspaper would comment on Finley's investigation, stating its
skepticism that studying such storms would be of little benefit to
anyone who had gone through the storm or to anyone in the future.
Indeed, Finley's work was met with skepticism in wide quarters. He set
up a network of volunteer "tornado reporters" all across the
tornado-prone areas of the Plains and Midwest. He devised a set of
parameters for predicting when tornadoes were likely to occur. He even
issued the first tornado forecasts. But there was a significant
struggle over control of the weather part of the Signal Corps and
Finley was not in good favor with his superiors. Finley's impressive
research was pushed aside to be forgotten and he was reassigned to
other duties.

INTERNATIONAL SPACE STATION VISIBLE TONIGHT: The ISS is very bright
now with its solar panels that are nearly as long as a football field.
Only the sun and moon are brighter right now. It will pass across the
sky starting in the north northwest at around 8:02 p.m. this evening.
It will take 8 and one half minutes to transit the sky. Check it out.

ON THIS DATE FIVE YEARS AGO: Harper County, Kansas was not the place
to be during the 2004 tornado season. On May 12th that year, a huge,
slow moving supercell thunderstorm produced at least ten tornadoes
across the county. The strongest was an F4 twister near the town of
Harper. Dramatic video was captured of a tornado lifting a house near
the town of Attica and disintegrating it in midair. The residents of
the house were fortunately in their basement and were not injured
seriously.

Then just seventeen days later, on this date, another supercell storm
produced as many as nine additional tornadoes across the county.
Fortunately, no fatalities were reported during either set of
tornadoes. I was fortunate to get the opportunity to see all of the
tornadoes live and in person on the second of my two tornado chasing
adventures.

Bill Murray

ABC 33/40 7 Day Planner: http://cfc.abc3340.com/abc3340/7day.cfm
ABC 33/40 Weather Blog: http://www.alabamawx.com

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TONIGHT
Mostly sunny.
Overnight Low 61
WIND: SW 6-12

SUNDAY
Sunny. A warm afternoon.
Morning Low 61 Afternoon High 88
WIND: NW 10-18

MONDAY
Partly cloudy.
Morning Low 64 Afternoon High 89
WIND: NW 12-22

TUESDAY
Partly sunny. Maybe an isolated PM shower or storm.
Morning Low 66 Afternoon High 87
WIND: NW 6-10

WEDNESDAY
Partly sunny with widely scattered mainly afternoon and evening storms.
Morning Low 67 Afternoon High 85
WIND: SW 6-12

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Tonight on ABC 33/40:

7:00pm Wipeout
8:00pm Here Comes The Newlyweds
9:00pm Pushing Daisies
10:00pm ABC 33/40 10pm News
10:35pm Law and Order SVU

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