Hurricane Ida To Effect West Tennessee

Saturday Forecast Update for August 28th:

Mostly sunny, hot but humid weather will continue for today into Sunday. Some afternoon and evening showers could pop up Sunday, with chances better later in the day. Heavy rainfall from Ida is expected to impact West Tennessee starting on Monday and moving out on Wednesday. We will have the latest on Hurricane Ida and your complete weekend forecast breakdown coming up right here.

Hurricane Ida is now likely to become a category 4 major hurricane by Sunday making landfall around Sunday afternoon packing winds of 140 mph.

THE WEEKEND:

Mostly dry weather is expected on Saturday but rain chances are not zero. They sit around 10-20% Saturday afternoon with highs expected to top out around 90°. Winds will come out out of the southeast all weekend and hang around the 5-10 MPH range. It will remain humid with the heat index approaching 100° again in the afternoon.  Overnight lows will fall into the low to mid 70s each night. Expect more cloud cover on Sunday, specially for the 2nd half of the day as some of the outer bands from a tropical storm system could move on in late. Rain showers will be increasing as the day progresses on Sunday. Rain chances will be greatest Sunday night and sit around 40%. Highs Sunday should still reach the upper 80s to near 90° before the clouds and rain chances move in.

NEXT WEEK:

If the forecast holds for the tropical storm system, heavy rain can be expected on Monday through Wednesday next week. Highs should only reach the mid 80s on Monday, around 80° on Tuesday and low 80s on Wednesday. If the storm passes over West Tennessee we could see anywhere from 1″ of rain and as high as 6″ of rain in some locations. But that all depends on where the storm moves after it makes landfall Monday along the northern gulf coast.  Here is a look at  total rainfall through Wednesday from Ida including here in West Tennessee.

TROPICAL SITUATION:

Models continue to take the hurricane up into west Tennessee and over into middle Tennessee with winds and rain from late Monday, Tuesday, and slowly winding down here by late Wednesday. Winds could gust over 40 mph at times with sustained winds around 30 mph and heavy rain.

Hurricane Ida is expected to become a major hurricane this weekend. The current forecast path is taking it into the Gulf of Mexico this weekend and continues to drift to the northeast. It is forecast to move to the north and make landfall somewhere along the Louisiana coastline on Monday as a category 3-4 hurricane with winds up to 140 MPH.

After it makes landfall it is expected to continue to move to the north or northeast and weaken back to a tropical depression on Tuesday. It will linger around West Tennessee through Wednesday before moving away to the northeast, but not before dropping some pretty hefty rain amounts across the region.

FINAL THOUGHT:

Not only are we now officially in tropical storm season, we are still in the middle of our severe weather season. So you need to stay weather aware to changing weather patterns and monitor the forecasts closely. We got you covered in the WBBJ 7 Storm Team Weather Center as always.

For tips on preparing for the storms, click here. To download the WBBJ 7 Weather app, click here.

Storm Team Chief Meteorologist
Joel Barnes
Facebook: @JoelBarnesWeather
Twitter: @JoelBarnes13
Instagram: @joelbarnes13