We realize that after surviving last week’s extraordinary heat you are probably reading this in hopes of seeing some hope of respite on the horizon. To make a long story short, there’s very little of that of this week. We’re sorry.

As for the heat last week, it truly was quite a bit beyond normal. The average high temperature was 98 degrees across the city, and it now seems certain that we’re going to beat an ugly record. Longtime residents will probably remember the summer of 2011 in Houston. I recall it because, during the month of August, every single day but one recorded a high temperature of 100 degrees or above. Anyway, June of 2011 was extremely hot that year as well, with an average temperature (that’s the daily high and low, divided by two) of 86.2 degrees. Well, my friends, through Sunday we’re averaging 86.5 degrees for this month. And the next 10 days look considerably hotter, so we’re going to smash the temperature record for June in 2011. No, I don’t know if that means this August will be like August 2011. It’s possible, but not a certainty.

If all of this depresses you, we’re here to help. We’re going to create a top 10 list reasons why this year’s heat and drought is actually kind of a good thing. I realize that finding 10 reasons is going to be a struggle, so I’d like your help. If you have suggestions, please leave a comment here, on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, or send an email.

Monday

High pressure remains the dominant factor in our weather, and high temperatures today should reach 100 degrees for most locations away from the coast. However, there is a slight chance—perhaps 10 to 20 percent—of showers developing along the sea breeze later today. Winds will be light, out of the east-southeast at 5 to 10 mph. Lows tonight may not drop below 80 degrees for most locations.

Tuesday

Conditions will be a couple of degrees cooler on Tuesday, as there may be a few clouds. Rain chances will probably jump to 20 to 30 percent, and this looks to be the day with the best option for rain for the next week. Look for highs in the mid- to upper-90s.

Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday

Heat really builds over the region, beneath the ridge of high pressure. Wednesday may stay in the upper 90s, but Thursday and Friday should see temperatures reach triple digits beneath sunny skies. Hot, hot, hot.

Saturday and Sunday

The heat wave looks to peak this weekend, with temperature readings between 100 to 105 degrees for most locations. It’s going to be brutal.

Next week

The models are fairly consistent in showing the high pressure ridge breaking down about a week from now, and temperatures dropping back into the mid-90s with some better rain chances by next Tuesday or Wednesday. That is a hopeful sign, but because this is forecast to happen 7 or 8 days from now, it is far from something we can take to the bank, I’m afraid.

Yesterday’s drought monitor update showed that drought has indeed expanded around the Houston area, rather significantly too.

Coverage of drought increased almost 10 percent, while coverage of extreme drought (Level 3 of 4) in the southern half of the region almost tripled week over week. We are still well behind 2011’s pace. At this point in 2011, the entire metro area was in level 4 of 4 (exceptional drought) compared to 0 percent today. But we are clearly in drought now, and it’s only going to get more extensive from here.

That said, we may get a little relief today!

Today

Today is beginning on a quiet, warm note once again. But there are actually some showers on radar in Louisiana, which indicates a weak little disturbance passing by. As that moves through our area today, we should expect to see at least a handful of showers or downpours develop. Let’s be fair here: Rain chances are only about 20 to 30 percent, but it’s the highest they have been recently and the highest they will be for a while to come.

There’s a better chance you won’t see rain today than you will, but at least there’s a chance. Aside from that, expect mid to upper 90s with sun, clouds, and a touch of Saharan dust still.

Saturday and Sunday

For the weekend, the good news is that if you’re planning anything for Father’s Day or Juneteenth celebrations, you probably won’t get rained on. The better news is that the Saharan dust will be outta’ here as well. So it will look a bit less hazy outside.

Of course, we stand a really good chance at finally breaching the 100 degree mark officially this weekend (yes, many of you already have reached this point but IAH has not), particularly on Sunday. Either way, it looks hot.

Next week

More of the same. 100 degree chances are with us Monday and maybe Tuesday with very slim to no rain chances. Atmospheric moisture levels look rather low most of next week, so I don’t expect much if any rainfall for most of the week.

Temperatures may actually bottom out on Tuesday or Wednesday. With a rebuilding ridge toward the end of the week, we may actually see our hottest weather of summer so far. More on that Monday. Whether it’s 98 or 102 next week, it’s just going to be hot.

Nothing out there we need to monitor for the tropics at this time.

I’ll leave on a quick note: If you missed Eric’s post yesterday, version 1.5 of the Space City Weather app is now available, and we encourage you to upgrade and inform us of any bugs you encounter. Thank you as always for your support.

When we launched the Space City Weather app last year, our goal was to give Houston-area residents everything they needed to know about local weather in a fast, readable, and intuitive format. We feel like we met that goal, and judging from your reaction, so did you! We were blown away by the number of downloads, which quickly surpassed 100,000, and has continued to grow. We’re also glad to see people using the app, particularly when it was needed most during periods of severe weather.

Because that was just the beginning for the app, we asked what features you’d like to see, and to let us know about bugs and frustrations. You gave us plenty of feedback, and for the past few months we’ve been using that data to make a more perfect SCW app. In large part due to your generous support during our 2021 fundraiser, we’ve been able to make some significant upgrades.

To that end, today we’re announcing version 1.5, and we consider it a collaboration with our users. Here’s what is new:

• The Houston area is a big place, and weather in one locale can be dramatically different from conditions in another. So we’ve more than doubled the number of cities in the app to a full dozen. We now track Houston (IAH), Hobby airport, Conroe, Galveston, Katy, Tomball, Beaumont, League City, Sugar Land, Lake Jackson, Baytown and Pearland. Tap the three-line menu in the upper left of the main page to see the list, and switch locations.

• We’ve added rain chance percentages to both the hourly and daily forecast tables on the main page.

• There’s a new, live National Weather Service radar page, accessible by tapping either the radar thumbnail at the bottom of the main page or the new Radar icon at the bottom of the app. You can zoom in and out to get a closer or wider look at radar conditions.

• You can now toggle between Fahrenheit and Celsius in Settings.

• We’ve fixed some frequently reported bugs, such as Android users’ inability to zoom in and out of images.

• There are tweaks to the layout and interface to make the app more attractive and intuitive. For example, the Settings icon is now found at the top of the list of cities for quicker access. 

There are two things we have not changed. We still don’t collect your personal information or do any kind of tracking. And, of course, there’s still no hype in Eric and Matt’s blog posts. 

The new version of the app should be showing up as an update for both iOS and Android users. And if you haven’t yet installed it, you can find it in the Apple App Store and Google Play Store by searching for “Space City Weather.”

We hope you enjoy SCW 1.5. If you run into any problems, let us know via email at [email protected]. And keep those feature requests coming. We’re already thinking about what to do next!

Steve Earle has long been one of my favorite music artists. He grew up in San Antonio and seemed to understand a little bit about the ways of Texas rainfall. In particular, I often recall his song “The Rain Came Down,” released in 1987, when I think about Houston’s penchant for either flooding or being in a drought during the summer months. The song itself is not about weather, but there’s this one line that just so perfectly captures my feeling about Houston summers:

And the rain came down
It’ll wash you away and there ain’t never enough

For a five year period from 2015 to 2020, it washed us away. Increasingly, this year, there ain’t ever enough. Take a look at this rainfall graphic for Hobby Airport, which shows the region receiving less than half of its normal rainfall for 2022. It’s that way for much of the region, especially for areas along and south of Interstate 10. Unfortunately, while we have a chance of rain the next two days, there continues to be little sign of the overall pattern changing.

Thursday

High pressure continues to dominate our weather, leading to continued high temperatures in the upper 90s for much of the region on Thursday. The difference today and Friday is that there will be more atmospheric moisture to work with, so it is possible the sea breeze will generate some pop-up showers and thunderstorms during the afternoon hours. Your chances today are about 20 percent, so I wish you luck. Winds will be light, out of the southeast, and you know the overnight is going to be sticky humid, don’t you?

Friday

As moisture levels peak, rain chances are probably best on Friday, reaching 25 or 30 percent. Otherwise expect more mostly sunny skies with highs in the upper 90s.

Saturday and Sunday

The weekend will be downright hot, with 100-degree readings possible on Saturday and the Sunday Juneteenth holiday. Rain chances don’t entirely go away, but they’re probably hovering at around 10 percent with mostly sunny skies.

Next week

I’m afraid that, for now, there’s no reason not to expect next week to be hot, mostly sunny, and mostly devoid of rainfall.