A slow moving upper level trough will continue to bring unsettled weather to the area with healthy rain chances likely for Saturday with decreasing activity for Sunday. Our in house “Futurecast” model is showing the possibility of and inch or two of rain accumulations in some spots tomorrow so unfortunately it won’t be good weather for clean-up and recovery. Highs pressure is expected to bank in from the northeast for early next week, essentially shutting down our rain chances and allowing for seasonably warm and mostly dry conditions Monday through Friday. I still have the chance of scattered showers for Sunday, but the skies should be brighter at times.
As for the tropics, per the latest Madden-Julian Oscillation Discussion (MJO), which is the long range tropical predictor that I blogged about in mid-August, tropical activity has quieted down. However the week two predictors indicate that conditions will become more favorable for tropical development in the Caribbean and perhaps the southwest/southern Gulf of Mexico/Bay of Campeche and the Eastern Pacific. I would expect developments in these areas, but upper level westerlies look rather healthy across our part of the Gulf through next week…we hope that it stays that way. We still have another three weeks of hurricane season prime-time for our part of the world…so we hope the westerlies and more cool fronts stay with us…the major storm potential has certainly decreased in the Gulf after to big storms in the last several weeks.