Matt Lanza

Rainfall totals on Thursday were rather pedestrian across the region. Some folks saw maybe a half-inch or so. Others saw none at all. The bullseye was east of Mont Belvieu in Chambers County, which saw just shy of two inches. Santa Fe down in Galveston County also did fairly well.

Today could see slightly healthier rainfall totals setup in parts of the area, especially along the coast. Let’s jump in.

Today

Radar this morning shows just a few showers along the coast, with a good bit more offshore lifting northward.

Some of these showers have a bit of heft to them, so rainfall is going to be feast or famine today. We should see a general trend of more numerous showers and storms heading into this afternoon. Rain totals though will vary widely. Some folks will see no showers today, while others may get a healthy 1 to 3 inches in downpours. Those pockets of heavier rains are likeliest south and east of Highway 59 though. We should reach the low-90s today without much issue, except along the coast, which will be a touch cooler.

Saturday

The plume of tropical moisture that’s helping to fuel these thunderstorms remains aimed at East Texas and Louisiana tomorrow, so I would again expect a fairly robust coverage of storms, particularly along the coast in the morning, gradually working inland in the afternoon.

Storm coverage may be a touch less than today, especially north and west of Houston. But again, expect feast and famine tomorrow, with some areas dry and other areas picking up an inch or two of rainfall. We should be able to get into the lower 90s before or in between storms tomorrow. Areas inland from Houston will be hotter. Storms should subside after sunset.

See full post

Thursday broke the streak. We fell one degree short of 100° officially, after 7 straight days of 101°+ in Houston. We don’t think we will hit 100° again for a bit, though I suppose one could sneak in here at some point over the next few days under the right setup. Regardless of all that, it continues to look hot and unpleasant for the foreseeable future, but at least we can mention a chance of rain almost every day.

Today

Radar this morning is already showing some showers and storms, mainly along the coast or east of I-45.

The storms were slowly drifting to the north. These should gradually fade this morning, and we’ll expect sun and clouds with high temperatures aiming for the upper-90s once more. Air quality today will be fairly poor, so if you fall into “sensitive groups” on days with high ozone levels, you will want to take it easy and stay indoors when you can. A few additional showers are possible this afternoon with daytime heating, but like yesterday, consider yourself lucky if you see one.

Weekend

Both Saturday and Sunday look pretty standard for what we normally expect in the back half of August. Look for a mix of sun and clouds on both days. Saturday will see isolated to scattered showers or storms in the afternoon. Sunday will probably see slightly fewer showers. Rain chances will be highest as you go to the east of Houston. So Baytown likely has higher odds of seeing a shower than Katy this weekend.

High temperatures will likely top off in the mid- to upper-90s, while morning lows will remain steamy at around 80 degrees.

See full post

For the first time in 380 days, Houston officially hit 101° on Thursday afternoon. Since 1980, we have averaged about 3 to 4 days this hot per year. Another interesting nugget about Thursday: With a high temperature of 101°, a low temperature of 81°, and a daily average temperature of 91°, it was Houston’s hottest day since August of 2016.

By far the most impressive statistic came from Galveston on Thursday. The temperature never dropped below 86°, meaning Thursday saw the warmest minimum temperature ever recorded in Galveston, with records dating back to 1874.

Since 2015, Galveston has set or tied 90 warm daily minimum temperature records, or near 25 percent of all of them. In just five years! This is consistent with what has happened elsewhere along the immediate Gulf Coast. New Orleans has set or tied warm minimum temperatures 120 times since 2015, while Tampa has done it over 130 times. Corpus Christi has has new warm minimum records over 50 times since 2015. This likely speaks to a combination of a fairly warm Gulf of Mexico in recent years and is also a symptom consistent with what is expected due to climate change. Galveston will likely match or exceed several more daily warm minimum temperature records before summer is over.

Today through Sunday

It’s going to be oppressively hot and humid again today. High temperatures will hit the mid-90s at the coast and upper-90s or 100° inland. Heat index values will again likely be at least 105° to 110°, with several locations likely to push even higher.

Galveston maxed out with a heat index value of 117° on Thursday afternoon. We may not be quite that absurd today, but it will come close.

Saturday and Sunday sees high pressure anchor itself over the state of Texas. This will keep the heat rolling on with more of the same: At least mid- to upper-90s for highs, with 100° or higher possible. Nighttimes won’t see temperatures drop below the upper-70s or low-80s. Humidity and heat index values may drop off just a bit on both weekend days as that drier high pressure sits overhead. If you’re looking for rain, you won’t find it here.

See full post

Tomorrow is the first day of August, which means we are now heading into the peak of hurricane season for the Texas coast through the end of September. It’s a marathon, and it’s important for all of us, residents, public officials, and forecasters alike to pace ourselves through the next few weeks. That’s partially why Eric and I are here, to let you know when a system is worth spending time worrying over. And right now, there’s nothing out there we need to be seriously concerned with.

Tropical outlook in a sentence

We are seeing tropical waves begin to move across the Atlantic with a little more aggressiveness now, and while some systems may develop over the next couple weeks, none at this point is a Gulf concern.

Near-term summary

The tropics have come to life in the last week, with several tropical waves that have at least managed to hold together more respectably than anything we’ve seen since hurricane season began.

You can see the waves lined up from earlier this morning on the satellite image above. The first one of note is what had been dubbed Invest 95L by the National Hurricane Center (NHC). It’s moving into the Bahamas now. It’s not organized in any meaningful capacity, and I believe it has lost the 95L tag, but the NHC gives it about a 10% chance of doing so over the next few days. Because of another trough digging into the Eastern US, this system will likely get pulled north and northeast toward or east of Florida. At this point, I think this one is a non-issue.

Slightly longer-term outlook

The next wave is about two-thirds of the way to the islands from Africa and is not a concern. Behind it, however, is a rather robust wave that I think has a pretty good shot of development.

This one will not develop in a day; the hurricane center is giving it a 50 percent chance of development by the weekend just east of the Caribbean islands. Where does it go from there? Read on.

See full post