It's finally raining!! Earlier this morning, a lot of our western counties got a good soaking. Grenada, Lafayette, Yalobusha, Calhoun, and Pontotoc counties had some good rain earlier this morning. Right now Prentiss, Tishomingo, Alcorn, and Tippah counties are getting lots of rain. We have the potential to see more rain showers and heavier rainfall today. So much cloud cover and rain overnight and earlier this morning will limit our high temps today to the mid 80's.
The stalled front to our north has transitioned from a cold front to a stationary front. It won't be going anywhere today or tomorrow, which is the main reason why we have such high widespread rain chances. Being in such close proximity to the front allows for us to be in the zone where the most combination of ingredients needed for clouds and rain to occur. We'll be in the frontal zone today and tomorrow. The main threat with showers and thunderstorms that develop today will be locally heavy rainfall and some local flash flooding. Winds in the atmosphere are very weak right now. Wind strength determines how fast storms move. If winds are weak like they are now, if storms develop they don't move very fast. We have a lot of moisture in the atmosphere right now too, so if anything does develop it has the potential to rain--a lot. With lots of rain and very slow or stationary storms local flash flooding does become a hazard.
The slogan for flooding is "Turn around, don't drown". Essentially, this means if it looks sketchy or dangerous to drive through, it probably is. There's no way to tell just by looking at water exactly how deep it is or how fast a current may be flowing. It only takes 6 inches of moving water to knock a person off his or her feet. Flooding can be a real problem with these stationary storms. Be careful if you're out driving and one of these develops. It only takes a few inches of water on a road to make cars lose traction.
After this front finally moves through on Friday, we'll see more sun and a return of more normal temps. We'll be mostly sunny for the weekend with typical 30% chances of rain. Temperatures will start a slow upward trend into the low 90's, with 93° by Sunday. Have a good Wednesday!
