In brief: Whether you like hot or cooler conditions; humidity or drier air; sunshine or clouds; and rain or not, Houston will offer a little bit of all of that in the middle of May. In the near term we’re going to be hot and sunny, although not blistering hot. Conditions turn a bit cooler toward the weekend, and Mother’s Day weekend looks rather nice. Expect some rain next week.
Tuesday
Will Houston hit 90 degrees for the first time this year, officially? The city’s main weather station at Bush Intercontinental Airport has gotten close this year, but not hit the mark. Today is a probably, as skies should turn mostly sunny by the afternoon hours. Winds will be fairly light, from the southwest at 5 to 10 mph. Highs will likely reach about 90 degrees for most of the area except for coastal counties. Lows tonight will drop into the mid-70s.
Wednesday
Pretty much a carbon copy of Tuesday, except for slightly windier conditions at the surface, with southerly gusts up to 25 mph. Highs may be a degree or two warmer.
Thursday
This will be another warm and partly to mostly sunny day. The difference is that we may see a few scattered showers and thunderstorms as a front approaches the metro area. But I think we’ll stay dry for the most part. Highs will be around 90 again, with some inland areas possibly reaching the low 90s as temperatures jump up a bit ahead of an advancing front. Expect another warmish night as drier air doesn’t really begin to arrive until Friday morning. The front’s passage looks mostly dry.
Friday
A nice day, with mostly sunny skies and highs in the mid-80s. With dewpoints in the 50s, the air will feel nicely dry for May. The morning could be breezy as said air moves in. Lows on Friday night will likely drop into the mid-60s.
Saturday
This will be about as nice a day as one could hope for in mid-May. We’re looking at highs in the low- to mid-80s, with dry air, and partly sunny skies. Another night in the mid-60s is likely.
Mother’s Day
The latter half of the weekend should see the introduction of some more clouds, and slightly more humid air. Look for highs in the low 80s. Some slight rain chances return on Mother’s Day, as a series of disturbances approach from the west. At this point, however, I think daytime shower chances are fairly low, perhaps on the order of 10 to 30 percent.
Next week
I don’t have a great handle on the details, but the pattern change that begins on Sunday likely accelerates Monday and brings a much better chance of rain. Decent rain chances may persist for much of the next work week. I don’t feel comfortable speculating on accumulations, but something roughly on the order of an inch or so for most locations seems like a decent guess. It doesn’t look like anything extreme, at least at this distance.
On the bright side we are a solid week past the average date of our first 90 degree temp and last year we had already had three ninety degree days by this date. I don’t ever remember a “cool” summer in Houston, Texas but there are less miserable summers than the one we experienced last year or in 2011.
So far, we are having a wet spring. This bodes well for us to at the very least avoid the inferno we had last summer. If this keeps up, than we may experience a normal Houston summer. Yes still hot and funky without a doubt, but tempered with afternoon thunderstorms that at least keep everyone’s lawns in decent shape.
My guess is that this summer will not be as extreme as last summer. However, this will depend on the pattern that sets up as we head into late June and July. Spring rains will only keep things temperate for so long. If we end up stuck under high pressure again than this summer will end up eerily similar to last summer. And since the Gulf continues to get hotter and hotter, our dew points and heat index values will continue to be off the charts regardless. My wish is that we end up having a low pressure dominated summer but not with crazy floods or anything. The summer of 2021 was a good example of this. There is almost never a happy medium with the weather though.
yes I hope we will have a nice mild winter too, tired of these extremes. The deserts on the west can have them.
The Summer of 2007 in Houston was close to average temperatures, because of all the rainy days.
Yes I remember that summer. it was actually below average temperatures in my area. I lived in Bay City at the time. We had like 20 inches of rain that July. It was nonstop rain through most of that summer. Then we had 2 years of drought in 2008 and 2009.