Summary: After a warm weekend, winter has blown back into Houston overnight. We’ll be sunny and colder for a few days before a warming trend begins Wednesday. Showers and thunderstorms are likely on Friday and Friday night ahead of another front that should bring drier and cooler weather next weekend.

Monday

You’ll want a jacket this morning, with temperatures in the 40s across the metro area, and winds gusting up to 30 mph. Winds will remain gusty this morning, but should start to ease up later this afternoon and this evening. Skies will be sunny today, but with the influx of colder air highs will likely remain capped in the 50s. Tonight will bring the coldest temperatures of the week, with lows in the 30s for inland parts of the region, and 40s closer to the coast. With clear skies and light winds we’ll see ideal conditions for cooling.

Tuesday

After a chilly start, this will be a fine day with sunny skies, light winds, and temperatures in the mid-60s. Temperatures on Tuesday night will be a few degrees warmer, and as winds shift to come from the southeast, we’ll see the beginnings of an onshore flow overnight.

Wednesday

This will be another pleasant day, with temperatures in the mid- to upper 60s. I think skies will bring a mix of clouds and sunshine, with the likelihood of mostly cloudy skies by Wednesday evening. With a light southerly flow expect lows on Wednesday night to drop only into the 50s.

Thursday

Temperatures will push into the low 70s on Thursday, with mostly cloudy skies. It looks like rain chances will hold off until the overnight hours, at the earliest.

Friday

This should be the most dynamic weather day of the week. The combination of an increasingly moist atmosphere, low pressure over the Gulf, and an advancing front will pump up rain chances. In terms of accumulations, I expect most of the area to pick up between 0.5 and 1 inch of rain starting early Friday and running into Saturday morning. The closer to the coast you live live, the greater accumulations are likely to be. Highs, otherwise, will be in the upper 60s on Friday.

Saturday and Sunday

The aforementioned front will push into Houston during the overnight hours, and likely be off the coast by around sunrise on Saturday or shortly thereafter. Rain showers should end during the morning hours but clouds will linger. So expect a cool day, with highs perhaps around 60 degrees. Saturday night will be cold, with lows dropping to around 40 degrees in Houston, and with colder conditions for outlying areas likely. Sunday looks to be sunny, with highs around 60 degrees. Expect another chilly night.

Next week

I don’t have great confidence in conditions next week, but I’d bet on something like highs in the 70s, lows in the 50s, and partly sunny skies. After Friday’s rain chances things look dry for awhile.

Summary: An area of heavy rain is expected to setup just northwest of Houston on Saturday, while the rest of the area sees mostly scattered showers. Exactly where this sets up will mean the difference between a washout and some nuisance showers. No serious flooding concerns are expected. Another wave of rain passes to our north on Sunday before cooler, drier weather builds in Monday. Most of next week looks quiet before we watch, sigh, more rain risk next weekend.

Today

Expect a mix of clouds and maybe a touch of sun today. Some coastal fog may drift in and out through the day, so if you’re down in Galveston be aware of that. Otherwise, much like yesterday a few showers should float across the area today, so you may encounter a brief downpour or two through the day. This seems likeliest north of Houston. Highs should again be in the mid-70s.

Saturday

Time to plan around another wet weekend. At this point it appears that showers will begin to break out just before sunrise south of Houston and lift northward through the city in the early daylight hours. By mid to late morning, we will be watching for basically a conga line of rain and thunderstorms to establish somewhere in the area along a stalled frontal boundary.

Admittedly, this is a little tricky. Stalled fronts can be a royal pain to try and pin down, but the best data we have at this point says that this line of rain and storms will predominantly focus north and west of downtown Houston. Where will that be? The axis from Sealy through Magnolia through Conroe through Lake Livingston is probably the most likely corridor to see this heavier rain. As of this moment. Could that shift south and east some? Absolutely. Could it shift further north and west away from the area? Absolutely. Under that axis it will be close to a washout. A few miles difference in location could change Saturday’s outcome for a few hundred thousand people. No biggie. So it’s a forecast to watch. But look for that to establish by late morning.

Outside of that somewhat narrow axis, there will be scattered showers or rumbles of thunder. But the day will not be a washout. Galveston for Mardi Gras? Mostly fine. Most areas south of Houston will just see a few passing showers.

The areas that see the mostly stationary line of rainfall will probably see on the order of 1 to 3 inches. Those outside of that will see varying amounts from a quarter to half-inch or so. Look for a sharp gradient between the have-lots and have-nots. Flooding should be mostly just ponding and the usual trouble spots seeing water. Still, be careful if you are driving north and west of Downtown on Saturday.

Aside from rainfall, Saturday should be a mild day with temperatures in the 60s under the rain and low-70s away from the dreariness.

Sunday

Additional rain or showers will skirt the area on Sunday. Most of this is expected to remain to the north of the Houston metro, so think like College Station through Huntsville or out toward Lufkin. Some thunderstorms embedded in that rain could be strong, and a slight risk (level 2/5) for severe weather exists for Huntsville, Lake Livingston, and Lufkin. Amounts of rain should be more modest Sunday with perhaps up to an inch or so under the heaviest rain and a half-inch or less in most other places. It’s possible that Houston and points south of I-10 see little to nothing on Sunday. Most places should start in the 60s and get one final day in the 70s before next week’s cooler weather.

Monday

After several warmer days this week and weekend, Monday will be a bit of a stark change. We should see a good deal of sunshine Monday, but with a chilly, gusty northwest wind pulling down cooler air, we’ll only top off in the mid-50s after a morning in the 40s.

Tuesday through Thursday

Temperatures will bounce back into the 60s on Tuesday and perhaps upper 60s by Wednesday or Thursday. Morning lows will be in the 30s and 40s Tuesday, 40s Wednesday, and 50s Thursday. No meaningful weather is expected, and we’ll probably a mix of sun and clouds most days.

Beyond Thursday

At this point I think Friday will be quiet, but there is growing potential for another decent rainmaker next weekend. Yes, confidence in another wet weekend is increasing.

When we’re forecasting this far out, particularly with respect to rainfall, we’re just looking for signals, not specifics. But the signal for next weekend has been consistent for the last few days in suggesting rain. We’ll see how that evolves over the next few days. But if you have plans next Saturday or Sunday, I invite you to lodge a formal protest with Eric. We’ll have more on those chances Monday.

Summary: The forecast remains on track, with a warmer and wetter period for the next few days ahead of a cold front on Sunday. That will bring sunnier, cooler, and drier weather back into Houston for a few days. If you’ve been wondering about the vague rumors about another polar vortex outbreak at the end of the month, Matt addressed them yesterday.

Thursday

It’s quite a bit warmer this morning across the region, with lows only dropping into the low 60s with a southerly flow in place. Skies will be cloudy today, with a light to moderate wind from the south, and highs pushing into the low- to mid-70s. The question is whether it will rain, and for the most part the answer is no. A few areas will see some light showers, but I expect them to be isolated with almost unmeasurable accumulations. Lows tonight should drop into the low 60s, with the possible development of some light fog.

Friday

This day will be quite similar to Thursday, with the exception of a bit gustier southerly winds. Friday night will be warm again, with a slight chance of showers.

Saturday

The weekend, alas, looks wetter. An increasingly perturbed atmosphere and an approaching front will produce widespread showers starting Saturday morning. Accumulations don’t look crazy. I expect most of the area to pick up between 0.25 and 1 inch of rain this weekend, with higher totals possible to the north of the metro area. This is not a flooding issue, but it will be a concern for any outdoor activities. Highs will likely be in the low 70s with cloudy skies.

Sunday

Sunday morning should bring more of the same before the front arrives, likely sometime during the afternoon hours. This may start to clear out our skies during the late afternoon or evening hours, ending the rain. Lows on Sunday night should drop into the 40s in Houston.

Monday and beyond

This looks to be a sunny, breezy, and colder day as we see the additional influx of northerly air. Highs may only reach the upper 50s, with northerly gusts up to 30 mph. Monday night looks to be rather chilly, with lows dropping into the upper 30s in Houston, possibly.

We’ll then see a gradual warming trend, but I’m not sure highs will climb out of the 60s. Additionally, after a couple of sunnier days, clouds return, and we could see several days of rain beginning on Thursday or Friday. I hate to make a prediction for another wet weekend, but yes, it’s possible.

At least 422* times per winter (*approximately), the question of whether “the polar vortex is coming” seems to come up. The sources are many: Rogue social mediarologists who want engagement, well-intentioned meteorologists who are just trying to explain something but the wrong takeaway gets amplified, not-well-intentioned meteorologists who can’t help themselves, and weather enthusiasts who are misinterpreting model guidance.

We are in one of those phases now, so is the polar vortex coming for us again like it (sort of) did in January?

Just to get the science lesson quickly out of the way: Recall that the polar vortex is always there. It’s a permanent feature that typically sits over the North Pole, keeping the hemisphere’s coldest air in the polar region. When we refer to the “polar vortex,” what we’re really referring to is the stratospheric polar vortex, which sits miles above the North Pole but keeps the cold locked in. During the wintertime, every so often something will happen where that cold can be dislodged and dumped into the mid-latitudes leading to cold air outbreaks over the North America, Europe, or Asia. How does that happen? Periodically, you’ll get a warming event in the stratosphere that eventually works downward, first displacing or splitting the polar vortex and then leading to high latitude atmospheric blocking that warms the Arctic and sends cold south. This is what can unleash some of that more noteworthy cold air.

The process is really complicated and fairly often, stratospheric warming does not lead to significant polar vortex disruption. But almost every time there is a warming event, you now hear about it because of what I noted in the opening paragraph.

So what is happening now?

If you look at the forecast weather map today, you can see a pretty anti-winter look in the Eastern half of the country, with very mild air from Hudson Bay south to the Gulf. The West is stormy. Most of the cold is up near Alaska or Siberia and over Scandinavia.

Over the next 10 days or so, this pattern is going to change rather dramatically. The ridging in place from Hudson Bay to the Gulf will weaken. The pretty neutral pattern from Alaska through the Arctic to Greenland is going to block up and warm. This will allow cold to displace back southward into lower latitudes in North America. The real serious cold is probably going to go on the other side of the globe, dumping into Russia and portions of Central Asia. One way to proxy this is to look at the Arctic Oscillation (AO). In a nutshell, the AO is a barometer for high latitude blocking over the Arctic. It’s far more complicated than just using one index to determine the fate of the weather. But in situations like this, it can help.

What does it tell us? When the AO is positive, it generally indicates that the Arctic will be cold. It can be assumed most of the time that the polar vortex is sort of in place, in its home over the North Pole. When the AO turns negative, it tends to mean that something has happened in the Arctic that leads to milder conditions and a weaker polar vortex, allowing cold to meander away from the North Pole and toward the populous mid-latitudes. Notice on the chart above that back in mid-January, we had a negative AO, which led to the cold outbreak. Also notice that not every negative AO produces excessive cold! We had a pretty strong bout of negative Arctic Oscillation conditions back in early December, which coincided with Houston’s most recent 80 degree day. We did turn colder after that day, but not excessively so.

Anyway, the AO is forecast to go negative, strongly so around mid-February. This gets a lot of meteorologists’ attention, and justifiably so. It’s a strong signal for strong blocking in the polar region. And indeed, if you look at the Climate Prediction Center’s outlook for days 8 through 14, it shows colder than normal temps forecast over a broad portion of the Lower 48.

Now, this map is plenty cold for sure. But it’s also moderate confidence. In other words, we’re not super confident in major cold right now. This meteorologist would say we are moderately confident in moderate cold. Frankly, modeling has been a little underwhelming with respect to the cold in mid-February. Some of the modeling that picked up on the ferocity of the January cold early on is not exactly doing so now, though it is forecasting cold. So at this point at least, a repeat of a January 2024-like cold outbreak in Texas seems like a longshot. But it’s going to be cold, and no, we cannot rule out a another (modest) freeze before winter ends.

This setup may be more interesting for the Southeast, particularly with a lot of moisture getting pumped in from California again. If you could perhaps combine some of that moisture into a well-timed low pressure system in the Southeast with some meaningful cold air, we could see some wintry weather in the South or Mid-Atlantic somewhere through late month.