Matt Lanza

Hurricane Beryl is now Tropical Storm Beryl as it lifts north across northwest Harris County this morning.

Beryl will make its exit to the north as we go through the next 2 to 3 hours. Conditions have improved south of Highway 59 and west of I-45, and that improvement will spread northward through mid afternoon.

Wind gusts: Most wind gusts are still on the order of 50 to 70 mph north of Houston under the stronger banding. Bush just reported 78 mph at 10:10 AM, while they peaked at 83 mph just a little earlier. Hobby maxed out at 84 mph before the sensor stopped transmitting data.

The highest reliable gust I have seen is 97 mph near Freeport at the gauge along the Brazos at highway 36. More reports will filter in, but suffice to say that 80 mph gusts are still a possibility north of Houston as this moves through. Even College Station managed to hit 56 mph with the top of Kyle Field reporting 90 mph (elevated winds will almost always be stronger).

Power Outages: All we can tell you is that as of this writing, Centerpoint reports over 2 million customers without power. That’s more than the May derecho and roughly 50 to 60 percent of the region. It will take time to restore it. We have no idea how long. We know many of you are frustrated, and we’re just hoping for the best like you are.

Cell service: Many in the area are experiencing weak cell phone service. You may not have any cellular internet access, with just a bar or two, but still able to text and make phone calls. That’s because cell towers are subject to power outages as well, but they have backup electrical systems – either batteries or generators – to keep basic communications going. That may include batteries that last between 2-8 hours. Some carriers have trucks to service batteries or refill fuel-powered generators, but while the storm is raging they can’t move around the area – just as you can’t. – Dwight Silverman (Thank you, Dwight!)

Bayou flooding: Several bayous have come out of their banks across the region. We can’t possibly go through all of them, but per Jeff Lindner at Harris County Flood Control, Brays, Keegans (lower end), Clear Creek, Armand, Brickhouse Gully, White Oak (I-10 to Downtown), and Buffalo Bayou east of the Beltway were all being monitored. The Flood Control map is a great resource to check on bayou levels and rain totals. They also do inundation mapping which is useful if you live near a bayou and want to know how the bayous are trending.

Street flooding: As rain gradually tapers off, street flooding will ease up a bit. It will take longer than usual, however due to copious amounts of debris on area roads. Try to limit travel through afternoon if possible.

Tornadoes: We’ve had a handful of tornado warnings, but I am not sure if anything has yet been confirmed or likely confirmed. A tornado watch continues through late evening north and east of Houston into Louisiana.

This watch box will likely be shaved down as we go through evening and Beryl moves out.

Beryl’s surprise: I saw a lot of comments from people that were surprised by Beryl’s wind. Admittedly, I was too. Beryl maintained hurricane status to I-10, which was a bit longer than expected I think, and the widespread wind gusts of 75 to 85 mph so far inland was really unnerving. Like the derecho and floods of the past, this will inform our coverage going forward. We will Monday morning quarterback the forecast plenty I am sure. Many of you already are, and justifiably so after any event like this. Look for more in the days ahead on what we saw and what we’re taking away from this.

Our next post will come sometime this afternoon. I’ve got a ceiling leak, a fence down, and two large limbs adjacent to my garage. Eric is dealing with no internet service (I’m sure many of you are as well). I can confirm both our generators are rolling, so we will be posting as in line with our schedule as possible. Thanks for your support and understanding, and we hope everyone is managing through this storm as safe and damage-free as is possible.

In brief: Beryl has made landfall near Matagorda, TX as a category 1 hurricane with 80 mph winds. It will now move north across Matagorda and Fort Bend Counties into western Harris County, while slowly weakening. Heavy rain, flooding, more frequent strong winds, and isolated tornadoes are all likely as Beryl pushes northward this morning.

As expected, Beryl waited until the end of its time over water to really get itself together, and we are fortunate it did. Otherwise, we’d be having a much graver conversation this morning. Beryl made landfall around 3:30 AM just east of Matagorda and west of Sargent down in Matagorda County, not far from the Brazoria County line.

Beryl is moving northward around 10 mph and will begin to gradually weaken now that it’s over land. The current storm track puts the center on a course to pass across Fort Bend County and western Harris County on its way north. The worst of the wind and heaviest of the rain will be near that track and to the east, which encompasses most of the western half of the Houston metro area. Here’s what we should be expecting over the next few hours.

Wind: Wind gusts have been as high as 75 to 90 mph near the coast as Beryl has approached. Expect widespread 50 to 90 mph gusts across Matagorda, Brazoria and southern Fort Bend Counties as this comes north. Portions of western Galveston County as well. Numerous power outages should be expected. Wind gusts will diminish a bit as this moves into Harris County and northern Fort Bend, but still strong most likely in the 40 to 80 mph range, highest south and lowest north. Subtract another 10 or so from that for Montgomery County. Winds west of the center will likely be a bit under these values for all locations.

Centerpoint is reporting almost 50,000 customers without power as of 3:20 AM. Expect this number to increase.

Surge: Storm surge has increased as I am drafting this post, up to around 3 feet or so at Sargent and 4 feet at San Luis Pass. Moderate flooding is underway as Beryl’s surge arrives. Water will peak soon if it has not already and will slowly decline over the next few hours.

Water will continue rising a bit longer on Galveston Island and in through the bays. Tiki Island is at moderate flooding levels now and a 3 foot surge. More flood gauges can be found here.

Rain: As expected, torrential rain is moving in with Beryl. Rates of nearly 2 inches an hour have been reported in the first major band of rain south of Houston as of 3:30 AM. As Beryl should track just west of Houston, the heaviest rains will likely be across Matagorda, Brazoria, Fort Bend, Galveston, Harris, and Montgomery Counties. Widespread street flooding is likely, and travel is discouraged until the rain tapers off later this morning.

Tornadoes: A Tornado Watch is in effect through 10 AM. I would expect to see a handful of tornado warnings come down over the next several hours as Beryl moves inland. They will move quick, so have alerts turned on on your phone or your favorite alerting app, and get to a low-level and/or interior room as quickly as possible if a warning is issued for your neighborhood.

Eric will have a full update on where things stand in just a couple hours, around 6 AM or so. Stay safe and dry everyone.

In brief: The main story over the next week will be heat, with high to periodically extreme conditions for the Houston area. Shower and storm chances will diminish but probably never get to zero. Saharan dust should show up this weekend before declining. And the tropics are busy with stuff to watch but no serious concerns for us at this moment.

Today through Sunday

As high pressure begins to expand over Texas, somewhat reminiscent of what happened last summer, the spigot should temporarily shut off here in Houston. We can’t rule out an isolated shower in the area, but the coverage of rain is going to diminish. The main story through the weekend will be heat. Heat advisories are in effect today and will likely be in effect tomorrow as well. Highs will be well into the 90s to near 100 in spots. Morning lows will be around 80 degrees.

Sunday will be interesting as a plume of Saharan dust arrives in Texas. We’ll see hazy skies which won’t help a ton with the temperature, but it may lead to a slight decrease in how bad it feels outside. Here’s the wet bulb globe temperature (WBGT) outlook for the next week, and you can see the slight dip on Sunday from “extreme” levels to “high” levels.

Remember, WBGT is a good, objective measure of how intense the combination of heat, humidity, wind, sun, and more is on the human body. Extreme levels, which we frequently hit last summer indicate heat where everyone should take precautions, even hardy Houstonians. High levels are more typical in Houston throughout summer. So, just take it easy this weekend.

Next week

The forecast is somewhat on autopilot for most of next week. High pressure should stay in tact, centered to our north or northeast most of the week, keeping us plenty hot, but never sending rain chances to zero. They will be quite low on several days though. Expect highs in the upper 90s to near 100 degrees with lows in the 70s to near 80 degrees; a very “high summer” feel for early July.

Fourth of July

At this point, it would seem that most plans should be good to go. We can’t rule out a shower, of course, but anything severely disruptive seems unlikely. Just make sure you’re hydrated (with water) and able to cool off. Evening festivities will probably see temperatures drop from the 90s into the upper-80s. Call it about a 10 percent chance of a shower or storm right now, but we encourage you to check back Monday for the latest.

Tropics

We continue to monitor Invest 95L, which is almost certainly going to become a depression or tropical storm by the end of the weekend. We have daily updates at The Eyewall, our companion site, and we will continue to provide those all weekend.

For now, we expect this to be a concern for the Lesser Antilles before it gets disrupted by land or the usual shenanigans present in the eastern Caribbean in early July. From there, all bets are off, but a general west or slightly north of west motion should continue toward Central America or the Yucatan. It is not a serious concern for us in Houston right now, but we’ll be watching it closely to see if anything changes.

The other system moving into the Bay of Campeche this weekend (Invest 94L) will move into Mexico with no impacts for us in Houston or Texas.

In brief: After a quiet weekend, rain chances pick back up Monday and Tuesday before potentially heavier and more widespread rain on Wednesday and Thursday. Tropical development in the Bay of Campeche will not directly impact Houston, but indirect impacts with rough seas, gusty coastal winds, and some tidal flooding will be possible.

Right out of the gate, we want to make sure people understand that next week’s weather is being driven by two entities: The first is the potential tropical system in the Bay of Campeche, which will not directly impact us. But the second will be the heavy rainfall on the north side, tangentially associated with it that will impact us. The latter continues to give us some forecast headaches, which we’ll explain below.

Today and Saturday

No issues are expected with plentiful sunshine. As always, a rogue downpour is possible in the afternoon, but much like yesterday it should be quick moving and very localized. Daytime highs will be in the low to mid-90s with elevated ozone levels as well, so poor air quality will be noticeable. Morning lows should be in the 70s tomorrow.

Sunday

For now, we expect much the same for Sunday, though a few extra clouds could begin to sneak in for the second half of the day, along with an isolated shower or downpour.

Monday & Tuesday

We expect scattered to potentially numerous showers and thunderstorms in the area on Monday and Tuesday afternoons, though it’s a bit soon to pin down exactly where these will be most likely. Think of the first couple days of the week as slightly juicier typical summer days. There could be a handful of stronger storms or localized heavy downpours. This should keep temperatures down a bit as well, mostly in the 80s to near 90 degrees.

Wednesday & Thursday

We are beginning to see decent model agreement that Tuesday night, Wednesday, and early Thursday will feature our highest rain chances, and with that will likely come some heavy rainfall. I think this is the timeframe where I would be watching closest for potential flash flooding. The trouble right now is that our models widely differ on where this occurs. Our typical physics-based models are focusing things on the entirety of the Texas coast, while our newer AI models favor Houston into Louisiana for the heaviest rainfall.

One other possibility in this scenario is that a lot of rain falls at the immediate coast or offshore, which ends up depriving inland areas of moisture. So there is at least a chance that we see a very sharp gradient of rainfall next week with high totals near Galveston and very manageable totals in Houston. Things should hopefully quiet down later Thursday and Friday, regardless.

Marine impacts

In addition to the rainfall, we will likely see some pretty considerable wind and wave impacts over the open waters next week. With rather sustained easterly or east-southeast 20 to 30 mph winds nearshore and 30 to 35 mph winds offshore, look for waves to begin to build to 8 to 10 feet over the Gulf by midweek. I would anticipate nuisance to minor tidal flooding issues as we hit high tide cycles on Wednesday and Thursday. We’ll want to keep tabs on this just because of the persistence of the onshore flow next week.

Bay of Campeche system

We continue to see about a 50/50 shot that a tropical system develops in the Bay of Campeche next week.

As noted above, this is related but separate from the rain we see next week. While development (low-end) is becoming more possible or likely, it is expected to quickly slide ashore in Mexico, so no direct impacts are expected on the Texas coast.

Beyond this, there may be another sloppy system that tries to develop the week of June 24th, but we have plenty of time to watch that. We’ll have more on next week’s rainfall situation over the weekend.