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August weather for Louisville....High: 105 ...26 days in the 90s. Low: 67 Rain: 1.61" This was the hottest August ever in Louisville. Today..the last day of the month had the lowest maximum temp and the lowest minimum temp for the month.
From the National Hurricane Center, the 5 day forecast track for a tropical depression takes a southerly course. The storm will become tropical storm Felix on Saturday and eventually become a hurricane.
The tropics are becoming active again...number 1 is intensifying...from the NHC: SATELLITE IMAGES AND SURFACE OBSERVATIONS INDICATE THAT THE TROPICAL WAVE AND ASSOCIATED LOW PRESSURE AREA LOCATED ABOUT 250 MILES EAST OF THE WINDWARD ISLANDS COULD BE DEVELOPING INTO A TROPICAL DEPRESSION. AN AIR FORCE RESERVE HURRICANE HUNTER WILL INVESTIGATE THE SYSTEM EARLY THIS AFTERNOON TO CONFIRM IF A DEPRESSION HAS FORMED. WATCHES AND WARNINGS MAY BE REQUIRED FOR PORTIONS OF THE WINDWARD ISLANDS... also number 3 may develop into something. The next names up are Felix and Gabrielle.
Following my post from last night about Phoenix hitting 30 days of 110 degree heat this summer...a record... Arizona scientists are saying the blame is to urbanization more than global warming. All that concrete in the desert heats things up.
A court case in Mississippi has resulted in favor of the insurance companies with regard to storm surge flooding during hurricane Katrina. The storm surge which was produced by the high winds flooded thousands of homes but the insurance companies said they were only responsible for wind damage and not flood damage. Click here
From the HPC the 5 day rain forecast has nothing here. The bullseye of 6 inches is in the Savannah-Hilton Head area. If you are heading to the beach this holiday weekend, thunderstorms are forecast across the southeast and Gulf beaches.
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The Jerry Lewis MDA Telethon is this weekend from Sunday 9:00 PM to Monday 7:00 PM. Dawn Gee and I will host the local portion of the telethon. Be sure to tune in. For the MDA Telethon official web site....click here
Here is the line up for Monday's Bike and Hike event from Mayor Abramson. This is a great event for the family to see some different views of Louisville while biking or hiking. The first 2,500 people will get a free t-shirt. For the web site....click here
9:00am Information Booths open
Sign up for Door Prizes
Pick up Route Map
9:15am Warm up exercises
9:50am Mayor's Welcome
10:00am TOYOTA "Call to the Post"
Bike Ride begins
10:20am TOYOTA "Call to the Post"
Walk begins
I have had a number of emails about my forecast from a couple of weeks ago when I predicted 70s for Friday, August 31. (tomorrow) I kept that in the forecast through last Friday and then upped the Friday high to 85 this past Monday. Two reasons for that change...one...we have had little if any rain in most locations locally so the ground is extremely dry and when the sun hits it the temperature skyrockets. That forecast was based on a generous rain as the heat wave broke and when it looked like we wouldn't get much rain I upped the temps. Well a few areas got that generous rain but most areas did not. The second reason is that the air mass is just a small bit warmer than it originally looked. The dry ground will add 4 degrees and the air mass change 2 degrees. Still a pretty good forecast from two weeks out forecasting a cool down. If low clouds develop on Friday and this looks possible especially over in the Lexington area, these locations may stay in the 70s so that original forecast would be correct after all.
Yesterday I had several calls and emails from people where it was raining telling me I missed the forecast. The forecast for yesterday was a 30% chance for storms. During the summertime, the percentage is a forecast of areal coverage of rain. In a 50 mile radius from Louisville yesterday, about 30% of the area got rain. The rain intensity has nothing to do with the 30%. Just because it is a low number doesn't mean it can't rain hard where it rains. The 70% of the area that stayed dry I'm sure would have liked to see some rain. Now for today I had a 30% chance and we ended up with about 10-15% coverage so I probably should have gone 20% except I thought there would be a little more thunderstorm activity than there was.
After flooding, lightning is the biggest weather killer and here is another tragic story from a thunderstorm in Spartanburg, SC....click here
From Denver here is a report about ethanol blended gas adding to the ozone problems when the weather gets hot.....click here
Even the people in Phoenix are complaining about the heat. They have now had 30 days this summer of temps at 110 or higher and that is a record. For more details....click here
KPNX had a web poll as to whether or not the heat wave is a result of global warming...58% said no and 42% said yes....in my opinion the 58% are right. As I have said many times, individual events cannot be blamed on global warming. If that was the case we would be getting heat records every year when in fact we get very few.
The GFS is bringing a pretty goood trough in late next week along with a swath of rain. Now the GFS has had trouble beating down the heat wave in this part of the country but by this point we are a week into September so maybe the cool surge will be enough. As far as the rain I'm not going to hold my breath. Almost all of these systems drop plentiful rain in Iowa and Illinois and weaken when they get here. Yesterday a few lcoations had over an inch with almost 5 inches in Jackson Co., Indiana the highest amount. Many areas had no rain again. The official Louisville weather station at the airport has us over 7 inches below normal for the year....all of that since Derby Day. At my home weather station my rain total is running over 13 inches below normal.
Numbers 1 and 4 have the highest chance to become a named storm, possibly over the weekend. Click on the map for a larger view.
It's been a rainy evening...for some. 3 inches near Irvington. Over 4 inches in SE Jackson Co., Indiana. Over an inch from Bardstown to Springfield. Some wind damage in the Irvington area. Many areas have had little or no rain whcih has been the story of our summer.
It's the 2 year anniversary of Katrina. I know a lot of the networks are doing special reports but I always like to go to the local sources. WWL-TV in New Orleans had the best coverage during and after the storm. Today they have a number of stories on their web site....click here. WWL is dropping the entire prime time line-up tonight for Katrina coverage which you can watch on their web site. WDSU-TV also has a number of special reports today....click here.
For a detailed report from the Louisville NWS about the current drought status....click here.
Here's a report from Atlanta about wells drying up leaving homeowners with no water....click here.
In Gloucester, Massachusetts, the water company has put restrictions on usage for the first time in 30 years....click here
Here's a report on damage from yesterday's storms in eastern Nebraska....click here.
Several cross country runners in Wisconsin collapsed from the heat yesterday....click here
It's the summer's first Free Ride Day on San Francisco public transit due to high pollution levels....click here.
The worst air in the country today is in California and in the Ohio Valley although our ozone values may not go too high due to the cloud cover.
Today is an Air Quality Alert Day. Get the latest index by calling 574-3319.
Minneapolis got hit with more severe weather Monday night. The power is now back on in most locations. Too much rain up there, not enough here....click here fior more on their storm damage.
A Tuesday afternoon storm at Upton, KY south of Elizabethtown blew down a barn.
I have had a number of requests for these numbers.....just another example of how hot it has been this month. The hottest August in Louisville history.
Click on any map, photo or graphic on the blog for a larger view.
This eclipse montage is from Duke Marsh of the Louisville Astronomical Society. Click on the image for a larger view.
This is from Paul Branham of W.P. Branham Photography. Here is his web site... click here.
Today's high in Louisville was 98. That's the 13th day this month with temperatures of 98 degrees or hotter. It could be many years before we see numbers like this again. Today was also day number 50 of 90 degrees or hotter this year. That's not as unusual as the other number.
Other highs...Owensboro 99 ...Evansville and Bowling Green 98 ... Cincinnati, Paducah and Somerset at 97.
Thanks to Bob for these two eclipse photos.
To me the moon had morer of a yellowish tint than a red color. For an article on the eclipse from Sky and Telescope Magazine....click here. They didn't have any photos in their gallery yet.
The 384 hour GFS brings a hurricane into Florida. Basically it's not a matter of if there will be another storm but when. Things should be heating up on the tropics front pretty fast by next week.
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From the National Hurricane Center.....2. A TROPICAL WAVE AND A BROAD AREA OF LOW PRESSURE LOCATED ABOUT MIDWAY BETWEEN AFRICA AND THE LESSER ANTILLES ARE PRODUCING DISORGANIZED SHOWERS AND THUNDERSTORMS. ENVIRONMENTAL CONDITIONS ARE FAVORABLE FOR SOME DEVELOPMENT AS THIS SYSTEM MOVES WESTWARD AT 15 TO 20 MPH.
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