Eric Berger

The Houston region appears likely to see an increasingly wet period beginning later this afternoon through at least Tuesday morning as atmospheric moisture levels spike above normal, and the absence of high pressure allows for the formation of showers and thunderstorms. To be clear, we’re not really expecting any significant flooding for most people—at least not beyond some street flooding—just the potential for several rounds of storms. Check the radar later today before embarking on any outdoor plans.

Unfortunately, it is hard to offer too much detail, as there is not great agreement among the high-resolution models about what will take place later today, tonight, and Monday. At a best guess, the potential for heavier rainfall should remain to the west of Harris County, and north of Montgomery County, through the early afternoon hours Sunday, but after that all bets are off.

At some point we are likely to see showers and potentially stronger thunderstorms sag into the metro area—moisture levels may peak after midnight tonight for central and coastal areas of Houston—and this will lead to better rain chances. At a best guess, most of the region will see 1 to 2 inches of rainfall through Tuesday morning, but as always there will be the potential for higher isolated totals, and some people are likely to miss out entirely. Most of Houston hasn’t had much, if any measurable rainfall in 11 days so some precipitation will be welcome for most.

We’ll be watching things later today and will update if needed.

The National Weather Service has issued several watches and warnings for this afternoon and early evening as a fairly intense line of showers and thunderstorms is moving toward the Houston metro area from the west. These storms are capable of producing damaging wind gusts up to 60mph, and quarter-size hail.

The severe weather has the potential to impact the entire metro area through around 8pm, but may linger across areas south of Interstate 10 until around midnight. The good news is they are moving rapidly from west to east, so individual storms should hopefully transition through the area quickly enough to avoid significant flooding problems.

Even so, it won’t be fun to be caught out in the storms, so please be weather-aware throughout this evening.

Good morning. We have a couple of more days with the potential for storms across Houston, but we’re not expecting anything like the widespread, long-duration showers and thunderstorms we experienced on Wednesday. This weekend still looks quite hot and sunny, especially Sunday.

Thursday

A line of storms has fired up early this morning, but it is weakening as it moves toward the Houston metro area. Unfortunately, however, these thunderstorms could bring another quick 0.5-1 inch of rain to hard hit parts of southern Fort Bend, Matagorda, and Wharton counties. After these morning showers, the region should see a break until later this afternoon or early evening. By this point another line of storms moving out of central Texas should approach the Houston area.

These storms may (hopefully) weaken again as they approach Houston, and NOAA’s Storm Prediction Center has highlighted an area well to the southwest of Houston as seeing an “enhanced” chance of storms. Even so, in Houston we’ll need to be on the lookout for potentially severe thunderstorms late this afternoon and into the evening hours—right around the evening commute. The biggest threat will be damaging winds and possibly some hail. Since the storms will move through fairly quickly, we don’t anticipate any significant flooding, despite our sodden soils. Highs today will be in the low 90s.

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