Have you been enjoying the sunshine for a change? This month has started off relatively dry, especially compared to last month, when I recorded 4.7" of rain for the first two weeks. And out of those 14 days, 11 of those had rain. I ended the month at 9.94" which is the most I've recorded for July in the 6 years I've been keeping records here. I am currently at 42.85" of rain for the year, which is only 1.31" away from the entire 2012 rainfall total, and that should be surpassed next week. You can see from the precipitation map above, that the central plains have received the most rainfall over the last 7 days. The area of high pressure over Texas is also evident by the lack of rainfall, and you can see that most of Georgia was dryer than most other areas in the southeast.
It looks like the honeymoon is over though, and now that we've dried out somewhat, it's time for a return of the moisture. The dew point on Friday morning was 64ºF, this morning it's been hanging around 71ºF, and it reflects the 1.9" precipitable water values that have moved over Georgia. A stalled frontal boundary stretching from the plains through the southeast will provide the focus for showers and thunderstorms as impulses ride along this front from around the ridge that is currently sitting over Texas. Most of the precipitation that has fallen from this flow so far has been west of us, where they had some flooding issues in Alabama. More impulses will continue to ripple along this stalled boundary through the first half of the work week, but the placement and timing are difficult if impossible to forecast. Later in the week, as the flow shifts to the south, lot's of soggy, thick air, will be returning later in the week as the door once again opens to the Gulf of Mexico and the Atlantic Ocean. The Bermuda High has been our friend this summer (if you like rain), and has been sitting in a perfect location to pump moisture directly into the southeast. The last several summers, the high would come so far west, we would get baked, with little to no rain and cloud free skies. You can watch this 500 mb GFS model loop to see how the upper level winds and moisture evolve over the course of a week (500 mb is roughly 18,000 feet)
But not next week... The precipitable water values shoot sky high (Sat and Sun as examples) once again, especially toward the second half of the week, so it won't take much to trigger a shower at any time of the day. Again, it won't rain all the time and maybe not every day. but when it does, expect the same heavy downpours that we had in the rain the fell last month. And at this point, the models are fairly agreeable that this pattern will stay in place for while... stay in place for a while... stay in place for a while.... uh.. oh... sorry, I think I got stuck. :-)
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