Severe Wx/Heavy Rain Setup

Good Friday afternoon! It's pretty cool across the GTR early this afternoon, and that cool feeling is being reinforced by the gusty winds across the area.

We had a weak frontal boundary pass through the area during the overnight hours into the morning that brought a few sprinkles here and there, and right along the boundary there is a relatively enhanced pressure gradient which is allowing the winds to be gusty at times this afternoon. This should relax throughout the remainder of the afternoon and tonight.

Much of the day tomorrow should be mostly clear with clouds increasing once again late tomorrow evening especially across the west in advance of the next storm system poised to impact Mississippi during the day and night Sunday, and potentially days after as well.

Here's the SPC Day 3 Outlook that is valid from 6 AM Sunday thru 6 AM Monday. Within the yellow areas, there could be some severe weather issues to deal with, particularly Sunday afternoon and evening. Let's talk about why..

Here's the 500mb GFS forecast for Sunday evening at 6 PM. We see a strong shortwave trough that is ejecting northeast into the Upper Midwest, with a ribbon of strong winds associated with it from across much of the middle and lower Mississippi river valley. Also to note, however, is the broadly positively tilted long-wave trough that's situated across much of the central and western CONUS (contiguous US).

At that same time, a cold front will be approaching from the west. Showers and storms should expand in coverage and intensity Sunday afternoon to our west and gradually spread into Mississippi later in the evening hours of Sunday. There looks to be some instability with this system as well as decent wind shear, so a few severe storms are possible, primarily in the yellow areas defined above in the SPC outlook. However, these areas can and likely will change over the next two days as additional details are ironed out, so stay tuned to for further changes with this forecast.

As referenced earlier, the broadly positively tilted trough will actually remain in place and allow for several more waves of energy to ride along the aforementioned front that will likely stall somewhere across the Southeast. This spells prolonged chances of rain and potentially heavy rain that could cause some flash flooding issues in some areas by mid-week, especially in the MS Delta. The GFS model shows a more focused shortwave moving through Wednesday that could provide one last round of showers and storms before a temporary clearing occurs before the next what looks to be whopper system barrels in from the northwest by the weekend that could bring some cold temperatures; so stay tuned!

Have a great Friday afternoon, and God Bless!
IW