Friday Evening July 26, 2024Forecaster: James SpannRADAR CHECK: Showers and thunderstorms, some with heavy rain, are mainly across the southwest and northeast corners of Alabama this afternoon. Some of the heaviest rain is over Mobile and Baldwin counties. The central part of the state is pretty much rain-free, but a few showers could form during the next few hours.Not much change is expected over the weekend; the sky will be occasionally cloudy tomorrow and Sunday with scattered to numerous showers and thunderstorms. Most, but not all, of the rain will come from noon to midnight. Stronger storms will produced heavy downpours, but the sun will break out at times. Highs over the weekend will be mostly in the mid 80s.NEXT WEEK: Heat levels will creep up during the week as the upper ridge slowly rebuilds across the region. Afternoon highs will be in the low to mid 90s by the latter half of the week. Scattered showers and storms will remain a possibility on a daily basis the higher coverage will likely come on Monday and Tuesday. TROPICS: An area of disturbed weather over the central tropical Atlantic Ocean is expected to interact with an approaching tropical wave during the next several days. Some development of this system will be possible while it approaches the Lesser Antilles during the early to middle part of next week and moves generally west-northwestward near the Greater Antilles toward the latter part of the week. For now NHC gives the system only a 20 percent chance of development.ON THIS DATE IN 1931: A swarm of grasshoppers descends on crops throughout the American heartland, devastating millions of acres. Iowa, Nebraska, and South Dakota, already in the midst of a bad drought, suffered tremendously from this disaster.ON THIS DATE IN 1979: Tropical Storm Claudette stalled over Alvin, Texas, inundating the town with 45 inches of rain in 42 hours. The total included 43 inches in 24 hours, which is the maximum 24-hour rainfall in American history.