Rain and storms next few days. Drier and a little cooler heading into the weekend!
Partly to mostly cloudy skies are hanging tough across the Tennessee Valley early this afternoon, and this is keeping most of us in the mid to upper 80s. The big exception is Iuka, MS that has already made 90 degrees, and then a few areas with rain have hung out in the lower 80s so far. Showers and thunderstorms are lighting up across the area on radar, and this will continue as we head through the afternoon.
Like the past couple of days, not everyone is going to get rain today, but the coverage of showers and thunderstorms will become increasingly widespread as we head through the afternoon. And like last night, these showers and thunderstorms may continue to develop during the evening and overnight. Locally heavy rainfall and frequent lightning will be the main concerns, but one or two storms may have some gusty winds. By daybreak on Wednesday, although we may have a stray storm or two, most of the overnight activity should have quieted down, with mostly cloudy skies remaining as we start the morning off in the middle 70s for most of us.
Rain chances stay elevated through Thursday as a cold front gradually approaches and moves through the area. It once again won't be an all day or everybody-gets-rain type ordeal either Wednesday or Thursday, but showers and thunderstorms will be fairly widespread. That front moves through by Thursday afternoon with drier and slightly cooler air to follow. We are back to returning sunshine by Friday and the weekend with lower humidity and daytime highs hanging out in the low to mid 80s! Morning lows over the weekend may be as low as the lower 60s! Definitely a welcome change, and maybe even an early hint at a preview of fall.
We are still watching the tropical disturbance out in the eastern Atlantic, but thunderstorm activity associated with it has been trending less organized the last two hours, and while it may still develop into a tropical depression, the overall chances of that are starting to decrease. Conditions across the Atlantic basin still aren't overly favorable for significant tropical cyclone development at this time.