279
FXUS64 KLIX 012333
AFDLIX

Area Forecast Discussion
National Weather Service New Orleans LA
633 PM CDT Tue Apr 1 2025

...New AVIATION...

.SHORT TERM...
(This evening through Friday)
Issued at 356 PM CDT Tue Apr 1 2025

Generally a quiet mild day today as the front stalled just south
of the coast early this morning but has already begun to retreat
back to the north. Quite a bit of cloud cover over the region
helped contain temps a tad with most of the area remaining in the
mid to upper 70s for highs today but that will be the end of 70s
for the rest of the week and into the weekend.

The weather is like an......onion. Onions have layers, weather has
layers. (yes I did pull out that quote). So what do I mean by
this...on the surface the weather looks generally uneventful and
rather quiet but as we peel back the layers there are some impacts
we see. Nothings too major at this time but impacts none the less
and hopefully can remain mostly on the lower impact side.

The pattern over the CONUS is going to be active but we will see a
healthy mid lvl ridge over the Bahamas setting up tonight and it will
remain in place and build through the week but the bigger driving
force will be a large and highly amplified ridge building just off
the Pac coast. The currently flat ridge appears to be centered
roughly around 20-25N and 140W but through the rest of the week will
build with the ridge axis extending well north into the Gulf of
Alaskan by as early as tomorrow night. What this is going to do is it
will allow the already   L/W trough over the western CONUS to remain
anchored as a significant amount of energy dives down the back side
of the trough. With the L/W trough over the western CONUS and the
ridge dominating the southeastern CONUS there will be a strong
persistent southwesterly flow regime set up across the northern
portions of the Lower MS Valley, Mid MS Valley, and into the OH/TN
Valleys. This is going to be harbinger of things to come for that
area as it looks like there could be multiple rounds of of strong to
severe weather but possibly worse VERY heavy rain across portions of
AR/TN/MO/IL/KY. Yes this is impacting us but if you have friends and
family in these area please make sure they are paying attention.
That said what it will do is lead to a set up across our area that
will remain in place through the rest of the work week and will
continue into the weekend and possibly after that or until at least
the cold next front moves through.

So what exactly am I getting at. This pattern will lead to a
boundary practically stalled from central TX into the OH/TN Valley
Wednesday through Saturday. Multiple weak sfc waves will develop
along that boundary with each disturbance embedded in the deep
southwest flow. Those smaller scale lows will run northeast along
it. At the same time high pressure currently over eastern Canada and
the western Atlantic will build and remain in place through the.
week. The combination of the sfc high off to our E/ENE and lower
pressure over TX will provide a very persistent and strong
southerly/southeasterly wind. This is already starting to set up but
overnight tonight and into the weekend we will see moderate to
strong onshore flow and that will set up across the entirety of the
eastern Gulf leading to a fetch that stretches from our coast all
the way down to the Keys and the Yucatan channel. This will drive
water towards the coast and with the easterly component will drive
into into our coast lines with no exit channel. If that wasn`t
enough we are also moving towards the Spring tide which peaks out
around Thursday but we will remain in a very elevated tide cycle
tomorrow and into the weekend. Waveland was already running .8-.9`
abv astronomical and with the increase both in time and wind speed
this will only become much higher. The easterly component will also
drive water into the tidal lakes and once water gets into them it
takes a while to back out and generally needs a good west wind to
really force it out quickly.

This setup resembles a setup we saw April 5th to April 10th last
year which was one of the higher tidal events we saw all year, even
higher than some location`s during Francine. With that we had already
issued a Coastal Flood Watch for the typical problem areas between
Waveland and Shell Beach. It still looks like we may be just one
more day from seeing some of the peak tidal values we will start to
see some impacts tomorrow. As mentioned earlier Waveland is already
running well abv normal and so is Shell Beach and they should begin
to run even higher abv normal as onshore flow picks up. Given that
we decided to start a Coastal Flood Advisory for the areas that were
already in the Watch. If these values run much higher abv normal
then they already are it will need to be upgraded to a warning which
should be much more likely Thursday and Friday as the water has
finally had enough time to pile up. For the rest of the coast and
tidal lakes we added them to the Coastal Flood Watch which runs
through Friday. These areas may not quite reach advisory criteria
quite yet but by Thursday should easily be well into advisory and
near warning criteria.

As for the rest of the forecast the other impact will be the
moderate to strong winds tomorrow and Thursday. A tight pressure
gradient across the area will lead to very windy conditions
tomorrow. 6mb across the area and winds that are almost
unidirectional from the sfc to h85 and mostly sunny skies will
promote fairly strong mixing and with h925 winds of 35-40 kt and h85
winds of 40-50 kt we should have little problems seeing winds gusts
in the 35 to 45 mph range across the region tomorrow.

The winds slack off some on Thursday but still remain quiet strong
with wind gusts likely around 30 to 35 mph possibly topping out
around 40. The wind may help it feel a little more tolerable the
next 2 days as highs climb into the 80s and some areas in the upper
80s. Can not completely rule out a rogue 90 in there Thursday
however the wind may help keep that contained as we will have a lot
of mixing. Friday looks fairly similar with breezy southerly winds,
still likely seeing gusts in the 30 to 35 mph range and highs in the
80s. Thursday and Friday there may be a few sprinkles out there but
overall we look to remain dry as everything remains well off to our
northwest. /CAB/

&&

.LONG TERM...
(Friday Night through Monday night)
Issued at 356 PM CDT Tue Apr 1 2025

It looks like we will finally see a pattern shift this weekend
and more so late this weekend. The L/W trough over the western
CONUS will finally begin to slide east and drive a cold front into
the area. This should bring showers and thunderstorms back into
the region late Saturday and into Sunday but exactly timing is
quite difficult as these types of setups can sometimes take a
little longer to move. That said we will have had 5-6 days of
recovery with a very moist and unstable environment in place. If
things line up there we will see another strong to severe weather
event Saturday night/Sunday but things lining up is the one things
that looks iffy at this time. We may see a decent cold front move
through but we will remain in southwest flow through the entire
event. We will need to keep a close eye on this system for the 2nd
half of the week. /CAB/

&&

.AVIATION...
(00Z TAFS)
Issued at 626 PM CDT Tue Apr 1 2025

Warm front is north of the area this evening with all terminals
reporting southeast winds. Quite a bit of low level moisture, with
most terminals reporting BKN-OVC clouds with bases between
FL010-FL020. While there may be periods where the cloud cover
scatters out, the expectation is that most of the night will have
MVFR to IFR ceilings at all terminals. Ceilings could lift above
FL020 by midday on Wednesday, but do not anticipate any prolonged
periods of VFR through the forecast period.

While winds were in the 10-15 knot range today, with the pressure
gradient tightening tomorrow, sustained winds of 20 to 25 knots
are expected at most terminals tomorrow with gusts perhaps in
excess of 30 knots.

&&

.MARINE...
Issued at 356 PM CDT Tue Apr 1 2025

The front stalled just off the coast early this morning
and has already begun to return to the north. Southerly and
southeasterly winds are thus returning and will increase through the
tomorrow and remain moderate to strong through the remainder of the
week and into the weekend. Not only will onshore flow increase but
with high pressure off to our east-northeast and low pressure slowly
taking shape over the southern Plains a rather long persistent
southeast fetch will set up over the eastern Gulf. This will lead to
hazardous boating conditions and well above normal tides across the
region and these impacts will last into the weekend before the next
cold front late in the weekend or early next week. /CAB/

&&

.PRELIMINARY POINT TEMPS/POPS...
MCB  68  87  71  88 /   0  10  10  10
BTR  71  89  73  88 /  10   0   0   0
ASD  70  87  72  86 /  10  10   0  10
MSY  72  86  74  86 /  10   0   0  10
GPT  68  80  70  81 /  10   0   0  10
PQL  67  83  69  83 /   0   0   0   0

&&

.LIX WATCHES/WARNINGS/ADVISORIES...
LA...Wind Advisory from 9 AM to 7 PM CDT Wednesday for LAZ034>037-039-
     046>048-056>060-064>071-076>090.

     Coastal Flood Watch from Wednesday morning through Friday
     afternoon for LAZ058-066>069-080-082-084.

     Coastal Flood Advisory from 10 AM to 7 PM CDT Wednesday for
     LAZ070-076-078.

     Coastal Flood Watch from Wednesday evening through Friday
     afternoon for LAZ070-076-078.

GM...Small Craft Advisory from 10 PM this evening to 1 PM CDT
     Thursday for GMZ530-532-534-536-538-550-552-555-557-570-572-
     575-577.

MS...Wind Advisory from 9 AM to 7 PM CDT Wednesday for MSZ068>071-077-
     083>088.

     Coastal Flood Watch from Wednesday morning through Friday
     afternoon for MSZ087-088.

     Coastal Flood Advisory from 10 AM to 7 PM CDT Wednesday for
     MSZ086.

     Coastal Flood Watch from Wednesday evening through Friday
     afternoon for MSZ086.

GM...Small Craft Advisory from 10 PM this evening to 1 PM CDT
     Thursday for GMZ532-534-536-538-550-552-555-557-570-572-575-
     577.

&&

$$

SHORT TERM...CAB
LONG TERM....CAB
AVIATION...RW
MARINE...CAB