Winter Storm Watches have been thrown out by the National Weather Service in Jackson, MS and Birmingham AL for the southern half of there forecast areas on Friday.  This evening we are noting some tremendous differences in track and strength of on our American models.  Our GFS model has a much better solution for a larger chunk of Alabama….and the NAM solution is much drier except for southern sections of the forecast area.  I still get the idea that snow will cause issues south of Interstate-20.  We will have to wait and see if the local offices expand the winter storm watches northward as the new guidance comes in during the overnight hours. 

I believe there is the potential for someone south of US-82 to pickup a whopper of a snow event…..maybe on the order of 6-8″+ totals.  So…..Selma…Camden….Montgomery….Troy…Greenville….this may be your huge snow hit that you haven’t seen in years.  Here are some percentages overlayed on our in house radar system…

This morning we are looking at a potential high impact winter storm affecting portions of Central and maybe South Alabama on late Thursday through Friday.  The stage still looks set for the southern 2/3 of Alabama to see a pretty good winter storm.  The computer models are pretty much in agreement….with there being minor differences in the surface fields.  The GFS is the outlier on the dry side, but climatology and the upper level fields on the model don’t really match the surface fields so most are throwing that model out.  The Canadian model is by far the wettest and snowiest model for our area….probably a bit too snowy. 

The one thing that is of interest is how the models from last evening tried to phase the mid level energy.  *IF* this were to occur….we could be looking at a major winter storm and given the track something along the lines of the February 1973 snow storm that hit East Alabama and West Georgia…dumping 14″ on the Columbus, GA area.  Again, we are going to get more in detail with this later this evening but all of the major players are on the field for a winter storm that we haven’t seen in quite some time across this area.

The National Weather Service in Jackson, Mississippi has already issued a Winter Storm Watch for southern sections of there area….primarily south of I-20.

Stay tuned….