1997 Weather Year in Review

As the clock strikes midnight on New Year's Eve, you'll be able to sum up 1997 weather across the area as very normal. Both temperature and precipitation across much of Alabama and west central Georgia were about average for the year.

Here are some general weather facts for 1997:

The 1997 figures for temperature, rainfall and snowfall are all very close to normal. Especially since the last week of 1997 looks fairly wet.

City	Hottest Temperature	Coldest Temperature	Rainfall	Snowfall
Huntsville	97 on July 27th	7 on January 11th	57.48	3.6 inches
Birmingham	97 on September 20th	11 on January 17th	55.49	1.7 inch
Montgomery	98 on August 18th	17 on January 18th	47.30	Trace
Columbus, GA	98 on July 3rd	19 on January 18th	51.59	Trace

Here are the average annual rainfall and snowfall for these four cities.

Huntsville	57.18 inches of rain and 4.1 inches of snow
Birmingham	54.58 inches of rain and 1.4 inches of snow
Montgomery	53.43 inches of rain and 0.3 inches of snow
Columbus	51.00 inches of rain and 0.7 inches of snow

As far as new record temperatures for 1997,

• Huntsville saw 11
• Birmingham had 3
• Montgomery broke 5
• Columbus set 9

Here they are:

As far as severe weather was concerned, again 1997 was slightly above normal with 29 tornadoes across Alabama. There were 16 tornadoes across the northern 2/3^rd of Alabama and 1 in the Columbus, Georgia area in 1997, they were:

Date	Tornado Strength	County	City	Deaths	Injuries
January 5th	F0	Jackson	Stevenson	0	0
January 24th	F1	Elmore	Elmore	0	0
January 24th	F1	Lawrence	South of Moulton	0	0
January 24th	F2	Tuscaloosa	Tuscaloosa	1	10
January 28th	F2	Tuscaloosa	Coker	0	1
Febuary 21st	F0	Shelby	Maylene	0	0
March 13th	F1	Muscogee	Columbus	0	1
April 22nd	F2	Dekalb	Rainsville	0	10
May 3rd	F0	Limestone	Reid	0	0
May 3rd	F2	Limestone	Athens	0	12
May 3rd	F2	Madison	Meridianville	0	1
May 3rd	F0	Madison	Owens Crossroads	0	0
May 3rd	F0	Madison	Owens Crossroads (two separate storms)	0	0
May 25th	F0	Madison	Huntsville	0	0
June 16th	F1	Colbert	Leighton	0	1
July 22nd	F0	Lee	Opelika	0	0
July 28th	F0	Cullman	Holly Pond	0	0

The only hurricane to impact the U.S. in 1997, was Hurricane Danny that plagued the coastal counties of Alabama in July with very heavy rainfall. The remains of Danny tracked north and caused downpours and severe weather across the Montgomery and Columbus, GA areas.

What does 1998 have in store for us weather wise? With the strong El Niño in place, there is a tendency to increase the precipitation and severe weather across the deep south.

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