A few showers possible today, mostly just hot this week in Houston

Summer roared back to Houston this weekend, with highs in the mid-90s across much of the region with mostly sunny skies. We’ll have more of the same this week, albeit with some slight afternoon rain chances on some days and a few more clouds to break up the sunshine. We’re not quite into the dead of summer—that typically comes about five or six weeks from now.

Monday

A bit of a tricky forecast today, because there is the potential for some rainfall even though most people are probably just going to see some clouds. A key factor today will be a plume of moisture moving into the central and southern Texas coast, which will lead to some pretty decent chances along the Coastal Bend. For Houston, the question is how far east these elevated moisture levels will get, i.e. will it get all the way to Galveston Bay?

As as result, rain chances for the western half of the Houston region are probably in the 20 to 40 percent range, whereas there is a lower probability in the eastern half (i.e. to the east half of Interstate 45) probably closer to 10 to 20 percent. Temperatures will also depend upon cloud cover, but I’m pretty sure we can count on the mercury reaching into the low 90s, at least.

Tuesday

With drier air expected, we’ll probably see a mostly sunny day with highs in the low- to mid-90s.

Wednesday and Thursday

We’ll see the potential for rising moisture levels again by the middle of the week, but this time the plume will be coming from the east, and the northern Gulf of Mexico. Again the question is how far this moisture reaches toward Houston, and the best bet is that the bulk of it remains offshore. As a result, we’ll probably have a chance for some scattered showers along the coast during the middle of the week, with significantly lower chances for inland areas.

Friday, Saturday, and Sunday

As for the weekend, at this point it looks mostly hot, sunny, and dry as high pressure asserts a little more control over the area. I’d expect highs in the mid-90s, with very low rain chances. The big weather story this weekend for the United States will probably be building heat over the northeastern part of the country under a burly high pressure system.

Next week

At some point next week the high pressure keeping us hot, humid, and rain-free over the weekend should break down, opening up the region to some showers. Hopefully these don’t mar July 4th celebrations for the region, but it’s something we’re going to have to watch for.