The good news is the low should finally begin to move eastward with a little more speed today and reach the Illinois to Indiana area by Saturday morning according to the NAM model. The GFS model shows a very similar situation occurring. From here, both models have the upper-level low continuing east, as it does the precipitation associated with it should weaken and push off of the East Coast. Once over the waters of the Atlantic, the cutoff low appears as though it will finally start to be pulled back into the jet stream making way for the next trough to enter from the Pacific.
What is stunning about this low is how much rainfall it dropped across parts of the nation. Below is the observed precipitation amounts for the last seven days ending this morning. As you can see, many areas in the southern Plains and across the Gulf states have been soaked by rainfall from this system. Many places in western Oklahoma, Missouri, Arkansas, northeastern Texas, Louisiana, and Mississippi have seen in excess of two inches of rainfall with some spots seeing over five inches of rain. Some areas in southwestern Louisiana have even seen amounts in excess of ten inches of rain with one place reporting just over fifteen inches from this week’s storms!
When taking into consideration the storm systems that worked through these same areas last week, the rainfall totals become even more impressive. Below is the image of observed precipitation amounts over the last 14 days ending this morning. The red colors depict areas that have received in excess of five inches of rainfall over the past two weeks which includes areas in western Oklahoma, Arkansas, northeastern Texas, Louisiana, and parts of Mississippi. Rainfall totals of over fifteen inches were observed across some areas of Louisiana with some isolated areas receiving close to twenty inches of rain over the past two weeks.
With all of this rain and still more to come for some areas as shown by the current radar image below, many rivers are currently experiencing or are forecasted to experience at least near flood stage to minor flood stage issues.
However, some river gauges, denoted in red and purple colors below, are currently experiencing or are expecting to experience moderate to major flooding, respectively.
Fortunately due to the mild winter across much of the nation, these rivers should recover fairly quickly from this excess rain because they will not have to deal with too much snow pack melt. In fact, as of this morning only 11.1% of the contiguous United States was covered by snow as show in the image below. There is almost no snow in the United States east of the Rockies, with just a few areas near the Canadian border in the northeast hanging out to light snow packs.
Like last week’s storms though, this was welcome news for many in the south to help alleviate drought conditions that have persisted in some of these areas for some time. In the meantime however, be on the look out for flooding and flash flooding. Somewhat more seasonable temperatures and less rainfall should return to the eastern half of the nation as we head into the beginning of next week.