Good morning. Houston remains just on the edge of summer weather, but we’re still not quite there. For much of the area, low temperatures are still dropping to around 70 degrees at night. And while daytime highs are reaching near 90 degrees, we’ve not reached the point of dog’s breath humidity either. That is coming, for sure.
Since today is the last day of May, I’d say it’s been a nice month. It is certainly possible for us to be seeing days in the mid-90s and sultry humidity in late May. But not this year, and it looks like May will end up with a slightly below normal temperature in 2023. I for one am enjoying this not-quite-summer weather.
Wednesday
Nearly all of the Houston metro area stayed dry on Tuesday, but there were some fairly strong thunderstorms on the periphery, including near Katy and Conroe, and well to the east of the region over Beaumont. So the potential is out there, and the atmospheric pattern will support additional scattered showers and thunderstorms today, with isolated areas picking up 0.5 to 1 inch or more of rain. About 20 percent of the area is likely to see rain. Otherwise, expect mostly sunny skies with high temperatures in the upper 80s to 90 degrees. Winds will be light, but generally from the southeast. Lows tonight will drop to around 70 degrees.
Thursday and Friday
Both of these will be mostly sunny days, with high temperatures around 90 degrees. Rain chances are not entirely zero, but they’re probably not higher than 10 percent each day. Lows drop into the low 70s, generally.
Saturday
I’m reasonably confident that the first half of the weekend is going to see a continuation of our mostly sunny, and warmish pattern. Expect highs of around 90 degrees. Rain chances, again, will be fairly low, so provided you’ve got protection from the Sun any outdoor activities look good to go.
Sunday and Monday
I have slightly less confidence heading into the back end of the weekend. High pressure is going to back off somewhat, and this will open the atmosphere up to better rain chances. However, there is very little consistency or agreement in the forecast models, so the forecast is pretty fuzzy. Broadly speaking, I’d peg rain chances at 30 to 50 percent each day, with accumulations of perhaps 0.25 to 1 inch of rain. Skies should be a mix of clouds and sunshine, with highs again around 90 degrees.
Next week
By Tuesday or so, I expect high pressure to start building again over the region. This should shut down the potential for rainfall, and may nudge highs upward, into the low- to mid-80s. But I’m not ready to lock that forecast in yet.
I’m sure you meant low to mid 90’s for next week’s temperature forecast.
Enjoy your postings. They are very helpful. I’d love to know more about why we are getting so many bad air warnings. I live north of Houston in the Conroe area.
Much of it is ozone, due to excessive vehicle exhaust coupled with sunny days (UV input is a catalyst for O3 formation) and poor ventilation during periods of low winds. I think when these air quality alerts are posted that they are applied for a fairly broad area, which you may be on the fringe of.
Dog’s breath humidity. Love it, Eric. Give me that any day over freezing weather.
I’ll take the opposite side: chilly weather beats dog’s breath humidity any day. And, twice on Sunday.
Below average temps for May and it was not due to rain. Love it! You won’t see that in the news.
most of the US had a persistent winter chill
Huh? Why not?
We’ve actually had a true “spring” season this year, that’s lasted more than a week or two. Maybe one of the first since I moved here. Truly enjoyable. Also, thank you, SCW, for grinding it out for us here each day.
Why is the high pressure system hanging out so much over us? it needs to go
High pressure hangs over us for much of the summer. It’s part of what stagnates things here and helps make the air quality so bad.
You won’t get an answer to this type of question on SCW.….that’s why the readers forum needs plenty of WX geeks to provide color and additional research.
Joseph elucidated on this topic a month or so ago and maybe can repeat to which….”why is the Houston area so dry”. Yes. I know there’s been shower activity this week but it’s all “sea breeze” and very scattered. So a lot of folks haven’t seen much rain. And dry Springtimes are so unhappy and not nice.
Not sure what you mean by a dry spring It’s been quite the opposite, plenty of rain in April and May and the drought is over for now.
It may not have been overall very dry, but there have been constantly recurring dry periods. Only April and the first half of May were wet. The rest of the time was quite dry, and for the past 3 weeks there has not been more than a drop of rain. It is so frustrating for my gardening when all the rain comes in one or two weeks and then there is a month with hardly anything. But this has been the constant pattern for the past few years. I read this is what climate change is going to cause more of; I sure hope not.
My best guess is that your area is probably just in an unlucky spot right now. I know that’s not a very scientific answer lol. Sometimes scattered locations are just frequently in the wrong place at the wrong time, meaning the storms always develop nearby but weaken as they approach certain areas due to the rain cooled air cutting off the warm humid updrafts. There have been a few years where my town kept getting missed over and over, and sometimes the storms would develop literally less than a mile from my house and it would be so frustrating. This is quite common with scattered sea breeze storms during the summer. It can make you feel as though your town is cursed. However heavy soaking rains always return eventually. Luckily since we are in a developing El Nino, maybe we will all see widespread soaking rains return this Fall and Winter. Hopefully we don’t get more than we bargained for as our climate tends to provide one extreme to the other.
Thanks Joseph. That’s it exactly. Two scattered very brief showers only since May 14 in the inner loop. For the larger area some got a lot, others not so much. Still dry here ….nothing measurable for 2 weeks. Last 2 days just a few drops.
PS I saw some noise on Twitter about the El Niño not progressing normally. Hot near Peru but still hot near Australia. That’s interesting.
Friends:
Y’ALL have the best charts! The May temp chart was very clear and informative!!!!
THANKS!
This was a very nice end to May for sure. We don’t typically see lows in the 60s over the last week of May like we have this year. Unfortunately 4 months of sticky nights in the 70s and 80s is knocking at our door.