West Alabama Tuesday Briefing

It is Tuesday January 9, 2025. Overnight torrential rainfall and high winds have now moved into Georgia leaving behind trees and power lines down, muddy rural roads and power outages.

More than 6,500 Tuscaloosa County residents were without power at the peak with surrounding county outages totaling from dozens to a few hundred. Alabama Power and electric coops hope to have the majority of outages restored by the end of the day.

Schools in Bibb, Greene, Pickens and Tuscaloosa Counties delayed classes for two hours this morning to make sure roads had been cleared.

That storm system dropped almost 5” of rain in Perry County, almost 2” in Tuscaloosa and Pickens Counties, 2.8 inches in Marengo County, 2.2 in Bibb County and 2.4” in Fayette County. The dry soils from the extended drought helped reduce the flood threat.

The overnight storm system is just the first of three that we will have to contend with. The second system will move in Friday bringing, showers, thunderstorms and possible tornadoes overnight. It is still too far out for specific forecasts on strength and timing, but the current Storm Prediction Center Convective Forecast for Friday shows most of the state under the gun this time.

Once Friday's storms move out some of the coldest weather of the season will move in. Global models are suggesting potential for snow flurries and/or freezing rain in North Alabama Monday or Monday night. While the forecast could change several times between now and Monday, confidence is high the coldest air so far this winter season will blanket the area Tuesday and Wednesday. Some places will be in the 10–15-degree range over the northern half of the state. Lows could reach the single digits in some areas.

The Forecast:

Today: Temperature falling to around 42 by 5pm. Breezy, with a southwest wind 10 to 20 mph, with gusts as high as 30 mph. Chance of some continued precipitation. New precipitation amounts of less than a tenth of an inch possible.

Tonight: Cloudy, then gradually becoming partly cloudy, with a low around 31. Breezy, with a west wind 15 to 20 mph decreasing to 5 to 10 mph after midnight. Winds could gust as high as 30 mph.

Wednesday: Sunny, with a high near 51. Southwest wind 5 to 10 mph.

Wednesday Night: Mostly clear, with a low around 34. South wind 5 to 10 mph.

Thursday: Sunny, with a high near 62. Southeast wind 5 to 10 mph.

Friday: Sunny, with a high near 62. Southeast wind 5 to 10 mph.

Friday Night: Showers and possibly a thunderstorm after midnight. Low around 48. Chance of precipitation is 80%.

Weekend: Sunny to mostly sunny days with highs in the upper 40s to lower 50s. Nights mostly clear with lows in the upper 20s.

MLK Day: A 30 percent chance of showers. Partly sunny, with a high near 49.

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Topping the News:

It is Special Election Day in Fayette, Tuscaloosa and Jefferson counties today. Polls will be open to 7:00pm in the Alabama House District 16 Special Election today between Republican Northport Attorney Bryan Brinyark and Democrat Fayette County Commissioner John Underwood. The vote was needed to fill the seat vacated by Kyle South who resigned to become the head of the Chamber of Commerce of West Alabama. Polls will close at 7:00 in Fayette, northeastern Tuscaloosa and western Jefferson County.

A $4.4 million federal grant will provide free job skills training for people in Bibb, Fayette, Greene, Hale, Lamar, Marengo, Sumter, Tuscaloosa, and Pickens counties.

Person interested can sign up for the training by going to a Career Center in West Alabama, or by clicking here.

Career Centers are located in Tuscaloosa, Demopolis and Livingston.

The Alabama Department of Transportation will soon begin fully replacing the US-11 / Skyland Boulevard East bridge over railroad tracks in Cottondale, which will lead to lane closures this summer.

John McWilliams, an ALDOT spokesperson in West Alabama, said they will replace and widen the bridge over Norfolk Southern Railroad near Clearview Hill Drive in Cottondale.

The new bridge will be wider than the existing one, with one lane in each direction and a dual left-turn lane as well as a sidewalk will on the east side of the bridge.

Work begins on January 15th and is expected to last at least through this Fall.

Meteorologists with the National Weather Service in Tallahassee will tour Panama City FL> today to determine if damage there resulted from a tornado on 70mph winds.

Significant damage is reported on the east end of Panama City Beach and Lower Grand Lagoon.

many Tuscaloosans have property in Panama City.

Water is again flowing through the Marion Water System in Perry County after two water pumps malfunctioned on Christmas Day.

The water system was forced to shut down during the evenings and when it was restarted each morning brown sludge poured out for a couple of hours and the water did not smell good.

Several pallets of bottled water were purchased and handed out by the county during the outage which sparked much anger from customers.

In Sports:

#1 Michigan Wolverines are the 2023 College Football National Champions. Thye knocked off the #2 Washington Huskies 34-13 in the title game in Houston last night.

It is the first outright national title for UM since 1948.

At least Alabama took Michigan to overtime.

#4 Georgia jumped two spots in the final Associated Press College Football Poll to leapfrog the #5 Crimson Tide, despite losing to Bama in December's SEC Championship Game. The Tide lost in overtime to the eventual national champions and Washington was embarrassed by the Wolverines.

No. 7 Ohio State was beaten in the Cotton Bowl 14-3 by No. 9 Missouri but still finished ahead of them. And No. 10 Penn State was overwhelmed in the Peach Bowl 38-25 by No. 11 Ole Miss and still finished one spot ahead of the Rebs in the final AP Poll.