Eric Berger

As expected, Sunday saw a burst of heavier rain showers across the area, with a few parts southern and eastern parts of the region (such as League City) picking up 3 inches. Fortunately these heavier rains moved on, because in some cases the rainfall rates exceeded 5 inches/hour over 15-minute periods. We’ll see the potential for more of the same today before our weather pattern takes a turn toward drier (although still very humid) conditions.

Monday

Plenty of atmospheric moisture remains spread across the Houston area today, but there’s not as much impetus for it to rise in the atmosphere. For this reason, I think we’ll see the potential for heavy showers on Monday, but they probably won’t be quite so widespread as we saw on Sunday. Nevertheless, where strong storms do develop, they will certainly be capable of causing some temporary street flooding. For this reason, beginning around noon today, it’s probably best to check the radar before making a trip across town. Mostly cloudy skies should help keep daytime temperatures at 90 degrees, or just below.

Tuesday and Wednesday

Atmospheric moisture levels (presently at about the 99th percentile for this time of year) should fall beginning Tuesday. With less moisture to work with, and high pressure moving in from the north, we expect to see a gradually diminished rain chances beginning Tuesday and Wednesday—probably only a 30 to 40 percent chance of moderate showers. With sunnier skies, we can correspondingly expect highs to nudge back up into the steamy lower- or mid-90s.

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As expected, higher moisture levels are pushing into the Houston region from the Gulf of Mexico today. This will lead to storms across the area, possibly widespread, as temperatures warm into the 80s later this morning. This provides the potential for a quick pickup of 1 to 3 inches of rain for a few areas, and depending upon the rainfall rates we could see some temporary street flooding.

The bottom line is that if you plan to be out and about from around noon to 6pm, check the radar, and be weather-aware. We’re not expecting widespread problems, but you should definitely be prepared for storms to pop up quickly, and drop a lot of rain. Monday will probably be similar (although with less coverage) before rain chances begin to dial down significantly on Tuesday.

Anyone who has lived in Houston knows there are basically two choices for weather during the months of July, August, and the beginning of September: Hot, sunny, and humid; or Warm, wet, and still humid. Houston has experienced both of these extremes already in July, with three days of highs in the upper 90s, followed by a day of 70s and heavy rain on the July 4th holiday. Over the next several days we’ll lean more toward the warmer and wetter variety, with an eye toward more widespread, heavier rainfall returning Sunday.

Friday

Storms have remained offshore this morning, and some slightly drier air has worked its way into the Houston region. However, as temperatures warm into the mid- to upper-80s later this morning, and the sea breeze gets going, I expect we’ll see some decent rain showers this afternoon, with a few heavy cells setting up (like we saw on Thursday, with a narrow, but heavy band of showers near Highway 288 and the South Sam Houston Tollway). I don’t expect significant problems. Look for highs around 90 degrees, or a bit warmer depending on how much sunshine your area sees this afternoon.

Saturday

I expect Saturday will be a lot like Friday, although with a few more clouds, and slightly reduced rainfall chances. The potential for heavier rainfall remains low, and any intense storms should be fairly scattered in nature. Highs in the low 90s.

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We’re coming to the end of June in Houston, and the city’s official temperature has peaked at 98 degrees so far. Although I don’t anticipate that the city’s temperatures will hit 100 degrees over the next week, as we get into July the overall probability of hitting the century mark will rise. With that in mind, here is some 100-degree day climatology for the city of Houston:

• Earliest 100-degree day: June 2, 2011
• Average first 100-degree day: July 24
• Average number of 100-degree days: 5

The absence of 100-degree days in June is probably a decent sign for the rest of the summer in terms of extreme heat, but alas there are few guarantees when it comes to weather.

Tuesday

Moisture levels are lower than Monday, so I expect few if any rain showers across the metro area today. Most probably, we will see hot and sunny conditions with high temperatures in the low- to mid-90s. If you picked today to skip work and head for the beach, you made a good choice weather-wise.

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