Rob’s First Alert Forecast - Wednesday, Aug. 17

TALLAHASSEE, Fla. (WCTV) - The radar was quiet as of 1 p.m. Wednesday, but the odds of showers and storms remained at 50-50 for the afternoon and evening. With a couple of those expected storms, a low-end risk remained for damaging wind gusts.

1:13 PM: The SPC is maintaining a very low risk of damaging wind gusts with some storms this afternoon. The AM weather balloon launch from Tallahassee showed some drier air in the mid-levels with one metric indicating wind potential. Now we wait for storms to fire up. #flwx #gawx pic.twitter.com/LLO42OHgdf
— Charles Roop (@CharlesRoopWCTV) August 17, 2022

The Storm Prediction Center placed the area under a marginal (level 1 out of 5) risk of severe weather for the area on Wednesday. The primary threat was damaging wind gusts as the environment appeared prime based on the weather balloon data. The setup of a surface cold front in the Southeast and a large-scale trough of low pressure aloft in the eastern U.S. will increase the odds of storms in the region.

Rain chances are forecast to be higher on Thursday and Friday (80%) with high temperatures in the upper 80s to near 90.

The trough and associated lift appear to move slightly north based on model guidance; therefore, for now, rain chances have been scaled back to 40% for the weekend. Those with weekend plans should keep checking back with the First Alert team for any forecast adjustments.

Guidance models do dip that trough aloft back towards the Southeast at the beginning of the new work week. This would heighten the odds of afternoon and evening showers and storms. For now, rain chances for Monday and Tuesday have been placed at 50%.

This story has been updated to add more detail to the forecast reasoning, and include Rob’s noon weathercast.

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