Matt Lanza

In brief: A warmer and sunnier stretch of weather should await the Houston area this week, albeit with lower humidity levels. The tropics are not a concern for us at this time, with any Gulf tropical system likely staying well to our south and east. We turn hotter and more humid this weekend and early next week.

I don’t know if Sunday was the unofficial first fall day in Houston, but the weather behaved that way to an extent. Overcast skies, some light rain and drizzle, and the hangover of a disappointing sports week seemed to make it so. Our high temperature yesterday was 81°, the coolest daytime high since July 14th, when we only hit 79°. This type of weather won’t last, however, as we move into something of a more typical warm autumn setup for the rest of this week.

Today

We have some lingering clouds this morning. And those clouds may be a bit stubborn, especially south and east of Houston. There will continue to be a shower chance to the southeast too with the cool front sitting just offshore. But overall we’ll call today partly cloudy to perhaps eventually mostly sunny, with highs likely bouncing back into the mid-80s.

Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday

As of now we expect all three days to be generally partly cloudy to mostly sunny. Highs will probably be in the upper 80s. Morning lows may not be too bad on Tuesday, with a chance that some places outside of Beltway 8 drop into the 60s.

Daytimes will be hot with those upper-80s, but the humidity levels will be less oppressive and more typical for October. There could be some showers, especially by Wednesday or Thursday, and especially south and east of Houston each afternoon.

Tropics & late week through the weekend

I wrote about the tropical disturbance in the southwest Gulf and Bay of Campeche yesterday at The Eyewall. I’ll have another update on that later today or tonight.

But the short takeaway is that we should not need to worry much about this system here in Texas. With a front draped offshore, and general southwest to northeast flow pattern, whatever happens there, be it a slopfest of moisture or a stronger tropical storm or hurricane will likely be carried to our east.

This is also well reflected in the model forecast of precipitation anomalies, which you can see over the next 7 to 10 days will likely end up well above normal south and east of our area.

So for Houston, this means that we will probably continue with these seasonably warm temperatures that may gradually trend to more unseasonably warm as we go toward the weekend and next week. We’ll probably see the humidity return late this week as well. This time, however, it does look at a front or fronts will break things up sometime next week. We’re beginning to see the pace of fronts slowly increase, which should mean that any higher humidity periods should be shorter-lived than they have been since September.

In brief: A humidity front pushed through overnight, which will allow today to be significantly less humid and a couple degrees cooler. Humidity does return heading toward next week. While we are continuing to track a possible cold front later next week, confidence remains quite low in what it will actually do for the Houston area, other than lowering high temperatures a bit.

Just as a reminder, in case you missed it, we did make an important comment about hurricane season in Texas yesterday. We also have big app update news!

On to the forecast.

Today

Do you feel less humidity today? You should. A weak little boundary pushed in out of the north and east overnight, and with perhaps the exception of the extreme south and west parts of the area, it should be noticeably less humid today. Dewpoints are running about 5 to 10 degrees lower than this same time yesterday, meaning it feels that much more comfortable.

It will remain hot for sure, so look for highs in the low-90s. Thankfully not as hot as yesterday’s 97 degrees. But that humidity will make it feel far less painful regardless.

Weekend

The humidity will slowly return this weekend, especially on Sunday. But otherwise, it’ll be more of the same: low 90s, maybe a few mid 90s, and sun and clouds. Rain chances, while not zero look to remain fairly low.

Early to mid next week

The late summer party continues early next week, with heat and a slight chance of a storm on Monday. By Tuesday, a cold front is going to work across part of the state. Our modeling confidence drops off beyond that.

Mid to late next week

Either the front is going to stall west of Houston keeping us warm and humid (80s) with thunderstorm chances. Or the front is going to slowly push through the Houston area bringing in less humid and pleasant weather with thunderstorm chances.

Let’s diagnose this a little further.

If you look at the European ensemble’s probability of highs near 90 degrees, you’d see Houston generally running at 70 to 90 percent odds most days through Tuesday. By Wednesday, those odds drop to 50 to 70 percent, Thursday’s odds are 20 to 50 percent, and Friday’s odds (shown here) drop to about 10 to 30 percent.

This is the under the hood element of the models we will look at to say, “Alright, you’re forecasting a certain value, but what does it actually mean the probability of X, Y, or Z is?” In this case, we have a decent signal that the odds of 90 degree heat are dropping through later next week. So, we at least can say that with some confidence. Will we get the full-frontal experience (rated G for Great)? That remains TBD. At this time, models want to keep our precipitable water levels pretty elevated into next weekend, which I would say is a proxy for higher humidity.

So sitting here today, I would expect declining temps but maybe not necessarily declining humidity, at least not substantially so later next week. That said, eventually one of these things is going to break through and allow lows in the 60s or 50s. It’s a matter of when, not if, and there’s still at least some chance next week’s front is the one. I’m just not terribly confident in that today.

At the least, we should all see a bit of rain next week, although the highest totals will probably stay toward Hill Country and North Texas.

We will have more on all this Monday!

In brief: After some locally heavy rain south of Houston on Thursday, we begin to revert back to strong late summer heat with mid to upper 90s back in action this weekend through early next week. Maybe we can disrupt the party a bit later next week, but it does not exactly look cool.

As Eric properly called yesterday, rain did impact much of the area south of I-10. A few locations picked up as much as 2 to 3 inches of rain, with the “official” big winner being a gauge along Cloud Bayou just south of Santa Fe which saw 2.68 inches.

Yesterday’s 88 degrees was the least hot day at Hobby Airport since September 1st, when we only hit 87 degrees. Congrats to those that saw the rain, as today and the next several days will see less of it, along with plenty of heat.

Today

Shower chances today will not be zero, but they will be highest well south of the Houston area, down toward Corpus Christi and South Texas. We will likely tack on somewhere between 4 to 7 degrees from yesterday’s high temperatures, pushing us back to the mid-90s with sun and clouds.

Weekend

We’ll continue to see low-grade rain chances persist this weekend, while the vast majority of the area will continue with a mix of sun, clouds, and high heat for late September. Highs will be in the mid-90s with a few upper-90s peppered about. This will begin to bump up against record highs which are generally 98 to 100 this time of September.

Early next week

The heat should peak around Monday or Tuesday in Houston with mid to upper 90s likely. The record highs of 100 will be safe, but barely. Storm chances may increase some later Monday or especially Tuesday as a cool front gets into North Texas. Unfortunately, it falls short of making it to Houston but having it in the neighborhood should mean we are vulnerable to some showers or storms, especially northwest of Houston. That said, don’t expect a soaking for most of the area.

Later next week

The heat may attempt to relax a bit here, nudging back into the low to mid 90s. Rain chances don’t appear especially high at this time. Overall, it will feel more like June than September for the foreseeable future. One day we will have more positive news for real!

In brief: Houston’s storm pattern may tick up a little on Saturday as the Gulf opens the doors a little wider. But Sunday, Labor Day, and most of next week should feature very typical September weather for the Houston area.

Back to regularly scheduled summer in Houston, as we return to a more standard early September pattern of daily storm chances, moderate heat, and, of course, humidity. Let’s check in on how the region fared over the Tuesday-Wednesday-Thursday period for rainfall.

If you were lucky, you saw a cooling downpour or two. If you weren’t, well, we apologize. But most of the area at least saw a little rain, and while that may not erode developing drought concerns, hopefully some additional rains fall the next few days. But also note how close it was to being a much, much different story.

Today

We’ve already got a number of showers peppering the radar this morning. Most gauges have only seen a few hundredths of an inch of rain, but some spots should see more over the next few hours. We may see a bit of a lull around late morning and then more scattered showers and storms this afternoon. Highs should still manage to make the lower 90s this afternoon.

Saturday

Tomorrow will be a slightly more interesting day on the storm chance front. Edouard’s remnant “spin” will shift southwest of the area toward South Texas, which should open up a slightly stronger “fetch” off the Gulf. This, coupled with some upper level impulses probably upgrades our coverage of thunderstorms tomorrow afternoon. If today is isolated to scattered, tomorrow is more like scattered to numerous in terms of coverage. Or that’s what I think looking at things this morning.

Any downpours will be capable of producing torrential rainfall, so watch for some localized street flooding. Highs may reach the low 90s, but if storms get going a little sooner, we may only get to around 90 degrees.

Sunday

Edouard’s remnants are gone gone on Sunday. This should allow us to dial back storm coverage a bit, back to the isolated to scattered bucket. Highs should be back in the low 90s.

Next week

I don’t foresee a ton of variability next week as it stands right now. Labor Day should be a lot like Sunday I think, with isolated to scattered afternoon thunderstorms. Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday look fairly similar. Each day should feature the requisite mixture of clouds and sun, with highs in the low to perhaps middle 90s.

The good news is that the tropics are on holiday right now, something I discussed over at The Eyewall last evening. Let’s keep it going.