March: Warm Days To End The Month With Isolated Showers

[srainhoutx]

Light to moderate rain with rumbles of thunder once again at my location as showers/elevated storms re develop to our W.

[Andrew]

Water vapor continues to show a flow of moisture from the SW and this should continue to spark more storms overnight:

http://www.ssd.noaa.gov/goes/east/sc/flash-wv.html

[JackCruz]

According to accuweather it's already 46 here in cypress and feels like 31. Rain steady coming down...been falling for over 2 hours non stop...or at least that's what it seems like.

[Ptarmigan]

Thunderstorms forming southwest of Houston. I expect to hear thunder later tonight.

[Karen]

do you think all of the rain down around Victoria will make it up here?

[djjordan]

Nice gentle soaking rains overnight at my house. Definitely going to be taking care of the lawn this coming week. Hoping we can continue the trend of just the right amount of rain per week or every other week through the spring and summer. Good Saturday morning everyone. Hope your weather day is fantastic.

[Katdaddy]

2.02" of soaking well needed rainfall here in League City. Watching more showers develop off the Middle TX Coast headed N toward SE TX.

[srainhoutx]

The over night guidance suggest a general 1-3 inches of rain are possible across the area with areas N of I-10 being the favored areas. At my location, nearly 3 inches of rain have fallen since yesterday afternoon and light showers continue at this hour.

A surface low is developing just S of Rock Port or just SW of Matagorda Bay and is offshore by about 75 miles and slowly drifting N. The upper low is currently spinning near the Arizona/New Mexico border and embedded short wave energy continues to move NE in the SW flow aloft from the Eastern Pacific across Old Mexico. Later today the front should begin to retreat N bringing a southerly to SE low level flow off the Gulf and temps should begin to rebound. Along with the retreating front, increasing instability may begin to fire off stronger storms and weak low level rotation is possible, so an isolated weak tornado or two is not out of the question as the afternoon/evening progresses. While severe storms do not appear to be an issue, heavy training cells with heavy rainfall rates are something that will need to be monitored.

Later tonight and into Sunday the upper trough will begin to trek E as the upper low finally begins to march NE across the Texas Panhandle. Rain chance will continue for Sunday and all depends on just how quickly the upper trough clears our area to the E before rain chances decrease. The HPC QPF forecast suggests some isolated 2-3 inch amounts mainly to our N but that will need to be watched as well. The SPC Day 2 Outlook has outlined a Slight Risk for portions of NE TX/NW LA/SW AR for tomorrow as the upper low ejects NE into the Southern Plains and trough slowly swings E across Texas.

We’ll see what the 12Z shorter range meso models offer a bit later and expect some further ‘fine tuning’ of the forecast in this complex and complicated weather pattern. Unfortunately, wxman57 will not be riding his bike this weekend, but the good thing is our drought situation is improving with every round of rain we receive so all in all there is little to complain about. Also, don’t forget to set you set your clocks forward tonight as Daylight Savings Time begins and you’ll need to change your profile settings to DST as well when you log in tomorrow.

[srainhoutx]

Morning e-mail from Jeff:

Rainfall event underway across the region.



Strong upper level storm system over the SW US combined with stalled frontal boundary offshore, developing coastal surface trough/low, and weak disturbances in the SW flow aloft all producing periods of rainfall across the region since yesterday afternoon. Rainfall amounts so far have averaged 1-2 inches for many areas with a few locations over 3 inches.



Upper level storm will begin to translate eastward toward the TX/OK panhandle tonight into Sunday and this will bring the greatest chance of widespread heavy rainfall and thunderstorms to the region. Height falls over NW TX this afternoon will continue to force coastal surface low development near the low TX coast which will begin to lift northward tonight. Large swath of strong warm air advection just above the surface will continue to support bands of showers moving NNW off the Gulf into the coastal bend this afternoon and the coastal front and surface cold dome is overrun by warm moist air just above the surface.



As the stronger core of lift with the upper level storm moves eastward tonight, the low level jet will shift into eastern TX with PWS increasing to near 1.5-1.7 inches (2SD above normal for early March). Additionally, the coastal boundary offshore will attempt to retreat northward and may move inland by early Sunday morning adding a good low level focus for thunderstorms/heavy rainfall. Expect thunderstorms to develop tonight across central into north TX in the region of greatest lift and then spread ESE on Sunday. Storm motions will slow with time and training will become more common. With grounds now saturated from previous rainfall flooding/flash flooding will become a bigger threat on Sunday. Not very confident where the greatest rainfall potential will be, and not overly confident that the forecast models have a good handle on the meso scale situation which tends to drive these heavy rainfall events.



Additional rainfall amounts of 1-2 inches is likely with isolated amounts of 3-5 inches possible with storm totals from Thursday-Sunday approaching 3-4 inches and isolated amounts of 5-7 inches across the region.



A few thunderstorms will be possible tonight with the threat increasing on Sunday. At this time any severe threat should be just north of the area, but if the warm front moves inland then there could be a greater threat than current thinking suggest. Will take a closer look at the severe threat this afternoon.



Storm system will push eastward Monday, but air mass does not dry out greatly and moisture along with noisy upper level flow (disturbances aloft) look to keep some amount of rain chances in the forecast for much of next week. Likely a few days will have better chances than others. Temperatures will warm back to March levels of lows in the 60’s and highs in the upper 70’s with scattered afternoon showers.

[srainhoutx]

DAY 1 CONVECTIVE OUTLOOK
NWS STORM PREDICTION CENTER NORMAN OK
1030 AM CST SAT MAR 10 2012

VALID 101630Z - 111200Z

...NO SVR TSTM AREAS FORECAST...

...SRN PLAINS...
EARLIER FORECASTS ON TRACK FOR TODAY AS LARGE SRN STREAM CLOSED
MID-UPPER LOW...NOW CENTERED OVER NRN MEXICO AND THE AZ/NM BORDER
AREAS...EJECTS NEWD TO THE SRN HIGH PLAINS BY EARLY SUNDAY. ZONE OF
QG-ASCENT WITHIN ERN FLANK OF THIS SYSTEM WAS CONTRIBUTING TO AN
EXPANDING PCPN SHIELD DOTTED WITH ISOLD EMBEDDED TSTMS ACROSS TX
THIS MORNING. SHOWERS/STORMS WILL CONTINUE TO SPREAD AND EXPAND
NWD/NEWD ACROSS OK AND INTO KS/AR THROUGH THE PERIOD. WITH THE
POSSIBLE EXCEPTION OF NEAR SURFACE-BASED STORMS TAKING FORM LATE IN
THE PERIOD NEAR THE TX GULF COAST...MOST STORMS WILL BE ROOTED ABOVE
A STABLE BOUNDARY LAYER AND FUELED BY MEAGER MUCAPE AOB 500 J PER
KG. THE LIMITED INSTABILITY MAY BE BRIEFLY OFFSET BY DYNAMIC ASCENT
AND SUFFICIENT SHEAR FOR UPDRAFT PERSISTENCE THUS CONTRIBUTING TO
THE OUTSIDE CHANCE FOR ISOLD SMALL HAIL WITH SOME OF THE STRONGER
TSTMS.

...NM/CO...
SMALL AREA OF LOW-TOPPED STORMS MAY DEVELOP AS THE COLD CORE LOW
SPREADS ACROSS THE HIGHER TERRAIN OF NRN NM AND SRN CO THROUGH
TONIGHT.

...FL...
RESIDUAL FRONTAL ZONE AND WEAK INHIBITION WILL LIKELY AID SCATTERED
DIURNAL CONVECTION OVER FL AGAIN TODAY. THE GREATEST CHANCE FOR
STORMS MAY BE DISPLACED SOUTH FROM FRIDAY ACTIVITY AS LATEST VIS
SATL IMAGERY SUGGESTS BEST LOW LEVEL CONVERGENCE MAY DEVELOP NEAR
DIFFERENTIAL HEATING ZONE AND WWD MOVING EAST COAST SEA BREEZE
BOUNDARY...EXPECTED TO BE NEAR AND SW OF LAKE OKEECHOBEE LATER THIS
AFTERNOON. WEAK SHEAR AND LAPSE RATES IN THIS AREA SHOULD PRECLUDE
SEVERE STORMS BUT A ROGUE GUST AND/OR SMALL HAIL CANNOT BE
COMPLETELY RULED OUT.

[texoz]

While this system probably won't be called a drought buster, it's definitely a drought-busting primer. If we get "normal" rain, and a couple more of these, or a good tropical storm moving across Texas in the summer, and the drought could be in our rear view mirror.

[Ptarmigan]

2.02" of soaking well needed rainfall here in League City. Watching more showers develop off the Middle TX Coast headed N toward SE TX.

That's the kind of rain we need, not the extremely heavy rain that falls in a hour.

While this system probably won't be called a drought buster, it's definitely a drought-busting primer. If we get "normal" rain, and a couple more of these, or a good tropical storm moving across Texas in the summer, and the drought could be in our rear view mirror.

A true drought buster is when there is widespread rain all over Texas. A large portion of Texas is in a drought. If we could have a December 1991 type rain event, the drought would end.

[Ptarmigan]

Morning e-mail from Jeff:

Rainfall event underway across the region.



Strong upper level storm system over the SW US combined with stalled frontal boundary offshore, developing coastal surface trough/low, and weak disturbances in the SW flow aloft all producing periods of rainfall across the region since yesterday afternoon. Rainfall amounts so far have averaged 1-2 inches for many areas with a few locations over 3 inches.



Upper level storm will begin to translate eastward toward the TX/OK panhandle tonight into Sunday and this will bring the greatest chance of widespread heavy rainfall and thunderstorms to the region. Height falls over NW TX this afternoon will continue to force coastal surface low development near the low TX coast which will begin to lift northward tonight. Large swath of strong warm air advection just above the surface will continue to support bands of showers moving NNW off the Gulf into the coastal bend this afternoon and the coastal front and surface cold dome is overrun by warm moist air just above the surface.



As the stronger core of lift with the upper level storm moves eastward tonight, the low level jet will shift into eastern TX with PWS increasing to near 1.5-1.7 inches (2SD above normal for early March). Additionally, the coastal boundary offshore will attempt to retreat northward and may move inland by early Sunday morning adding a good low level focus for thunderstorms/heavy rainfall. Expect thunderstorms to develop tonight across central into north TX in the region of greatest lift and then spread ESE on Sunday. Storm motions will slow with time and training will become more common. With grounds now saturated from previous rainfall flooding/flash flooding will become a bigger threat on Sunday. Not very confident where the greatest rainfall potential will be, and not overly confident that the forecast models have a good handle on the meso scale situation which tends to drive these heavy rainfall events.



Additional rainfall amounts of 1-2 inches is likely with isolated amounts of 3-5 inches possible with storm totals from Thursday-Sunday approaching 3-4 inches and isolated amounts of 5-7 inches across the region.



A few thunderstorms will be possible tonight with the threat increasing on Sunday. At this time any severe threat should be just north of the area, but if the warm front moves inland then there could be a greater threat than current thinking suggest. Will take a closer look at the severe threat this afternoon.



Storm system will push eastward Monday, but air mass does not dry out greatly and moisture along with noisy upper level flow (disturbances aloft) look to keep some amount of rain chances in the forecast for much of next week. Likely a few days will have better chances than others. Temperatures will warm back to March levels of lows in the 60’s and highs in the upper 70’s with scattered afternoon showers.

Sounds like summer in terms of plenty of moisture in the air.

[srainhoutx]

The 12Z GFS and Canadian are suggesting a bit of a break for the early afternoon hours before things ramp up again in the rainfall department. Both models suggest activity will increase during the over night hours into tomorrow and possible training cells with heavy rainfall rates increasing along Middle Texas Coast and into SE TX. The NAM (WRF/NMM) suggests heavier rains for the Central Texas region and points N and E toward the ARKLATX region. Latest Water Vapor Imagery suggest additional short wave energy moving out of Old Mexico heading E. Surface obs and radar data depict a surface low just SE of Rock Port with increasing SE winds gusting to near 30 mph offshore.

We’ll need to monitor the trends throughout the day, but indications are heavier rains will return and may well last well into Sunday with the favored areas being along and W of the HWY 59 Corridor. We will see.

As far as the extended forecast goes, it does appear we’ll get a break before repeating an active pattern late next week as a deep trough digs S into Old Mexico, W of the Intermountain West setting the stage for yet another upper low bringing additional rainfall to the Lone Star State. This active pattern appears to want to repeat about 6 days or so which will tend to go a long way to easing our drought situation across Texas.




12Z GFS:

12Z Canadian:

[mckinne63]

It's clearing up here in Stafford. While still cloudy, can almost see the sun trying to peek through those clouds.

[texoz]

check out the 7 day rainfall totals in Kauai!! Nearly 46 inches of rain. (see link below)




http://www.wunderground.com/blog/JeffMa ... rynum=2048

[djjordan]

Those are some amazing rainfall totals in Hawaii. If we had that kind of rain here in that span there would obviously be some serious problems here. 3" hail and a tornado in Hawaii??? Glad I didn't pick this past week to visit the islands LOL.

[Ptarmigan]

check out the 7 day rainfall totals in Kauai!! Nearly 46 inches of rain. (see link below)




http://www.wunderground.com/blog/JeffMa ... rynum=2048

That is the annual average rainfall total for Houston! Well, Claudette dumped 45 inches and Amelia dumped 48 inches of rain.

[jasons2k]

So far I've measured 1.54" from the last two days. The next round is starting-up now...

[jasons2k]

I'm getting some good booming thunder here - that cell about to cross I-45 near Spring looks like a pretty potent storm.