Thursday, June 30, 2011
What a day it was yesterday. I tried to mention as many folks as I could during our weather. We need a local weather channel, no doubt about it. It was amazing showing your only Live Doppler Radar showing heavy thunderstorms over most of the area with an estimated 1,620 trillion drops falling from the individual thunderstorm cells. That is a mind-boggling number, and it is amplified when you consider a few of those thunderstorms yesterday stalled. This means neighborhoods around Ed White High School were swamped with 3 inches of rain in as little as 40 minutes. It was a gush of rain that folks have been waiting for since last year when the drought settled in. Roadways like Cassat Avenue and Normandy Boulevard turned into rivers.
Today once again thunderstorms will have plenty of moisture to work with and lift thanks to an old frontal boundary moving in from Georgia. It will have no problem ringing out a trillion rain drops or more per storm. In St. Marys, Patty Crosby has a pumpkin patch that is producing an early, enormous pumpkin especially for this time of year! Now we know why! I am ready to celebrate with some pumpkin pie!
The good news is the cloud cover we are having this morning not only helped me on my run but it will stabilize our atmosphere enough that there is less than a 10% chance of any severe downbursts or wind gusts of 58 mph or greater. Lightning and lowland flooding will once again be our main threats on our Thursday afternoon. Lightning is not causing new wildfires anywhere close to the rate we saw last week thanks to some areas now close to 8 inches of rain for the month which includes the Okefenokee Swamp and Espanola!
We still have quite a few burning although the number is less than half at what it was and once in awhile we have a new one that pops up like we saw in Woodbine, Georgia yesterday captured by Nichole. Thanks for sending that in. So bring on the rainfall nature! We need more especially in Keystone Heights, Mandarin, Julington Creek and the beaches! We still look to be drying out this weekend and heating up so it is crucial we get more rain and of course I will keep you updated.
Last but not least in the tropics our rainy pattern is not being influenced by Arlene which has made landfall in Mexico as a tropical storm this morning. But the rainy pattern impacting us actually helped give birth to the first named storm of the season in the Atlantic.
This brings us to our PRANG FACT of the day. We all know about the rainfall drought that is finally improving, but there is also another drought in Florida many have not heard of. It is a hurricane drought! Since Wilma hit Florida as a category 3 back in 2005 we have had no hurricane strikes! This is one of our longest hurricane-free spells on record for the Sunshine State. Remember 40% of all hurricanes that form in the Atlantic hit Florida. That number is more impressive than the trillion rain drops! Secondly we should have had at least 4 hurricanes hit Florida since Wilma in 2005. WE HAVE HAD NONE! This is just how lucky we have been and as we all know it is not a matter of if but when the next one strikes and it will likely be sooner than later. It still looks like South Florida and the West Coast of Florida have the highest risk this year. You stay safe and cool. Have a great last day of June and be ready for another swoon, especially if you love rain! I will see you soon! Thanks for reading and take care.
No comments:
Post a Comment