A calmer Thursday for Houston

After yesterday’s wild weather, things will scale back a bit today, and we should end up calmer. All bayous and rivers are within their banks and generally lowering, including the San Jacinto River at Humble, which briefly popped into minor flood stage last night.

Calmer weather doesn’t mean totally dry, however. Over the next several days we’ll be dealing with a few disturbances to bring us more rain chances, though at this point none look quite as significant as what we just experienced.

Today

We’ll see a return of some sunshine and heat today, as we start the day partly to mostly sunny. A few showers will be possible south and west of Galveston this morning, down through southern Brazoria and Matagorda Counties. As we heat up, I do expect at least a few more showers and storms to develop elsewhere in the region, but these will be more of the hit and miss variety, with many neighborhoods staying dry today. Expect high temperatures in the lower 90s.

Any storms that do occur today will be capable of briefly heavy rainfall and some gusty winds, as well as lightning. So just be aware of that.

Friday through next week

With atmospheric high pressure to our north, our weather will continue to come from an easterly direction over the next several days. There are multiple small disturbances that will pivot around the underside of this ridge, bringing us a boost to our rain chances on several days between Friday and Monday or even Tuesday of next week. Again, at this point, none look quite as substantial as yesterday’s. There are two primary disturbances I’m keying in on: One goes just to our south on Friday, so perhaps rain will be enhanced in the Coastal Bend. The other comes through here on Monday. In between those, we’ll still be open to scattered showers and storms each day.

The rain totals map from the Weather Prediction Center is shown, and it suggests we’ll average about an inch of additional rainfall through next Wednesday. I am confident, however, that there will be a few smaller spots that see 2-4″ or even more spread out over the next five to six days. At this time, we don’t think it will come all at once like yesterday’s event. Flooding risk day to day is fairly low, but if we do get any slow moving storms, particularly with Friday’s or Monday’s disturbance, we will need to watch for some pockets of flooding.

Temperatures will be held down due to the rain chances and clouds, but it will still be hot and humid. Expect upper 80s to lower 90s each afternoon. We may see the pattern flip back hotter and drier after Tuesday of next week. More on that as we get closer.