textproduct: New Orleans/Baton Rouge

KEY MESSAGES

Updated at 606 AM CDT Fri Jun 5 2026

- A weak tropical wave will continue to slowly approach the LA coast today. This is leading to strong winds and will drive rich Gulf moisture north into the area today through the weekend.

- Strong easterly to east-southeasterly winds will continue today leading to hazardous marine conditions and minor coastal flooding. A Small Craft Advisory remains in effect for all of the coastal waters. A Coastal Flood Advisory remains in effect for all coastal areas except surrounding the tidal lakes through Friday. - Abundant moisture will help lead to numerous to widespread light to moderate showers and embedded thunderstorms Friday through the weekend. Areas east of I-55 and along and south of the 10/12 corridors will have the greatest risk of seeing locally heavy rain.

SHORT TERM

(Now through Monday) Issued at 1235 AM CDT Fri Jun 5 2026

Looking at satellite and radar right now and you may be thinking "Wait I thought we would see numerous showers and thunderstorms the next few days as that weak tropical wave approaches the coast. Did y'all pull a fast one on us?" Well, can't fault you for thinking that. Radar over SELA and southern MS and all the way well south of our coastal waters is absolutely quiet. Not one little shower over our area or moving towards it. Checking satellite and yep even that shows little in the way of cloud cover. In fact the biggest blow up of convection, and it isn't even that big, is over 400 miles southeast of the mouth of the river. The actual sfc wave at 7z was is a little more than 100 miles south of the mouth. Checking in on the TPW sensor on GOES19 and you can clearly see much drier air over the northeastern 3rd of the CWA but there is a wedge of much drier air over our coastal waters. A much deep surge of moisture is just to the south of that and is working north and there is abundant moisture over southwestern LA and along the coast of central-LA. The combination of that much drier pocket of air (TPW is only indicating PWs around 1.6 which is a good 4-5 tenths lower than the two airmasses to the northwest and southeast of it. If is because of that wedge of drier air that we aren't seeing the typical nocturnal convection we see with more tropical like environments. However, this looks to be temporary. All indications are that the blob of rich Gulf moisture to our south will continue to slide north and should begin to move into coastal sections of the CWA around midday. With that convection will be much slower to get going today with initiation likely b/t 18 and 21z. At the same time our sfc wave should be moving in over coastal SELA this afternoon as well. LL winds will respond especially south of coastal MS. This increase in the LL convergence along with the deeper moisture moving in will finally get better coverage over the area. with the greatest potential east of I-55.

Convection looks like it will taper off for the most part overnight, which again in a more typical tropical system normally we would see convection consolidate and not outright dissipate. That said there will likely still be a few showers through the night. After the sun comes up, our little wave should be be inland and probably half way through the CWA. After sunrise we will quickly start to heat up and given the surface wave will still be over the area and abundant moisture in place, numerous to widespread convection is expected to develop much earlier and spread faster. One concern Saturday is the potential for locally heavy rain. A few more things will be in place Saturday compared to today and the biggest difference is instability. We will heat up a little more efficiently causing the environment to be much more unstable than today. In addition We will be under a weird almost split flow type jet. This places the entire area under decent upper level diffluence which that in conjunction with the higher instability will lead to more efficient rainfall. Again the location with the greatest potential for locally heavy rain appears to be east of I-55 and we hate to day it but possibly peaking over portions of coastal MS and just west of the Pearl River over portions of the North and South shores. This includes all of the coastal MS urban areas, but even locations like Slidell and New Orleans could see periods of moderate to intense rainfall.

PoPs will remain elevated on Sunday but overall we should see a slight tick down in coverage and intensity. The better support will be pulling north and east of the region and even though PWs will be slightly lower they are still hovering around 2" so not necessarily drier air but drier when compared to the possible 2.15-2.2" PWs we will see Saturday. We may also see a touch more subsidence in the mid lvls as the eastern Gulf ridge tries to spread west while the mid lvl disturbance that is currently entering TX from Mexico will be pulling away lifting across the NE/KS/MO/IA borders. /CAB/

LONG TERM

(Monday night through Thursday) Issued at 1235 AM CDT Fri Jun 5 2026

On Monday evening, an upper ridge will be centered over the northern Gulf with an extension northeastward into the upper Ohio River Valley. Shortwaves will be over Illinois, Kansas and California in southwesterly upper flow.

The upper ridge is expected to build northwestward into Texas Wednesday and Thursday, with an inverted trough or easterly wave moving into the eastern Gulf and approaching our waters by Thursday. The GFS operational runs bring this wave across the area late Thursday, while the 12z ECMWF operational keeps it further south over the Gulf.

Models are in pretty good agreement about the weather being mostly dry Monday night through Tuesday night, with the GFS solution being a bit wetter beyond that point. The current forecast and NBM numbers would be a bit more supportive of the GFS scenario.

With the mostly dry scenario for Tuesday, highs are likely to top out around 90 in a good portion of the area, and perhaps a degree or two above that. Wednesday and Thursday could also get that warm, especially if the trough/wave doesn't directly impact us. A wetter solution would likely mean mid 80s for highs. /RW/

AVIATION

(12Z TAFS) Issued at 606 AM CDT Fri Jun 5 2026

All terminals remain in VFR status at this time but will likely begin to slowly see cigs lower as the richer moisture starts to push in. We are currently seeing a few very light showers develop along coastal areas but these are fairly small and light and not persisting much. We should begin to see this activity slowly pick up around 16/16z. GPT, NEW, MSY, and HUM would see impacts first as -SHRA begin to develop. Between 19/22z convection should begin to build and increase in coverage impacting ASD and HDC, BTR and MCB will likely be the last two terminals that see impacts. Overall most of the activity should be in the form of -SHRA but cigs will likely drop to around 2200-2800 while convection is over the terminal. That said there will be a few embedded storms./CAB/

MARINE

Issued at 1235 AM CDT Fri Jun 5 2026

A tight pressure gradient remains in place between a weak wave approaching the LA coast and high pressure over the southeastern states. This continues to lead to strong easterly winds which will become more east-southeasterly today. Sustained winds of 20 to 25 knots have been and will continue to occur over all of the coastal waters through today before finally beginning to relax overnight tonight. We are also seeing occasional to frequent gusts above 30 knots. Seas are generally ranging from 4 to 8 feet with the higher seas in the outer waters. We will continue to see some improvement from a wind and sea standpoint over the weekend but showers and thunderstorms will likely impact most of the coastal water through Saturday. /CAB/

LIX WATCHES/WARNINGS/ADVISORIES

LA...Coastal Flood Advisory until 10 PM CDT this evening for LAZ058- 070-076>078-080-082-084-087-091-093-095-097-098.

GM...Small Craft Advisory until 7 PM CDT this evening for GMZ529- 531>536-541-543-551-553-554-557-570-572-575-577.

MS...Coastal Flood Advisory until 10 PM CDT this evening for MSZ086>088.

GM...Small Craft Advisory until 7 PM CDT this evening for GMZ531>536- 541-543-551-553-554-557-570-572-575-577.