Chilly Weather to Pass; Rain Possible Late Next Week
Hopefully, everyone is enjoying the pleasant temperatures that are actually a few degrees below normal. Tonight and Friday night are likely to be the coolest nights for North Georgia for the next few days, as a taste of fall strikes the area. The reason we’re getting the colder air is that a low pressure system sits to our north — essentially the remnants of the front that brought us some rain earlier in the week. Because the air around low pressure systems rotates counter-clockwise, the air movement is forcing colder Canadian air south into Georgia. However, the low is going to move out to sea quickly, and we will see a return to normal to above normal temperatures going into next week.
The good news is that, at least for a short while, we are possibly going to see a return to a more typical weather pattern for the second half of next week, at least as far as rainfall is concerned. If things work out as some models are suggesting, a series of fronts will move from the west coast to the east coast next week, bringing a reasonable chance of rain on Wednesday, and again on Friday. The Climate Prediction Center’s long range forecast is calling for a better than average chance of rain from the 19th through the 25th.
Let’s hope they’re right, because any rain at all will help the drought. In a front page article today, the Atlanta paper reported that there might only be three months more water left in Lake Lanier. Of course, they didn’t say whether that three month figure assumed no rain at all, normal precipitation, or a tropical system washing over Hall County. In the next few weeks, we are going to see some new recommendations from the state EPD on additional ways to conserve water.
The current level four restrictions are only reducing water usage by about 10% from what you would see normally. Barring exceptional rainfall, which grows less likely as the tropical season comes to an end, I don’t see those restrictions being lifted soon. The next round of restrictions could cause real pain, depending on where they land. For instance, the biggest water user in the city of Atlanta is Pepsi, which makes Gatorade here. You could save a lot of water by telling them to go bottle elsewhere, but that would put an extraordinary burden on one company and its workers. Or, you could tell golf courses, which are currently allowed to water their greens, to stop using water entirely. That would keep the burden in one industry as opposed to one site, but would effectively kill it off. or, do you cut off the flow down the Chattahoochee, and possibly cause the extinction of some mussels on the Florida coast?
If we don’t get some significant rain soon, we are going to have to make some wrenching decisions. I’m hoping we get a lot of rain next week.
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