January: Increasing Clouds/Rain & Warmer To End Month

[MontgomeryCoWx]

Wanna do it all over again on 2/3-2/5?

[niner21]

I'll bet that we get a dusting of rain and that's it.

Greetings niner21,

You posted this on Sunday. Thought I would go back now and comment.
Hope you didn't make a bet on anyone with this.

That's what I call reverse weather psychology!!!! Usually when they call for huge rain, we get zilch. Call for 30%, we get a colorado river in my back yard.


Take it easy on this Texas State Grad!! (It was Southwest Texas when I was there in 1999). It was the best 4 years of my life so far!!!

[niner21]

1.77" in Westbury, making a total of 8.6" for the month.

So can we say that we're "Above Average" for precipitation this year LOL!!!

[txflagwaver]

Supposed to rain today?

[srainhoutx]

Supposed to rain today?

The rain is done. Skies have cleared in NW Harris County. It will be a gorgeous day!

[Belmer]

I'll bet that we get a dusting of rain and that's it.

Greetings niner21,

You posted this on Sunday. Thought I would go back now and comment.
Hope you didn't make a bet on anyone with this.

That's what I call reverse weather psychology!!!! Usually when they call for huge rain, we get zilch. Call for 30%, we get a colorado river in my back yard.


Take it easy on this Texas State Grad!! (It was Southwest Texas when I was there in 1999). It was the best 4 years of my life so far!!!

Hahaha!! Well then, hello there Bobcat grad. Yes, I have loved it here since I've been here. I didn't like it beginning of my freshman year, but I think that's just adjusting to meeting new people and being away from home and just being on your own. But I love it! San Marcos is a beautiful city with so much to do.

Now, on your reverse weather psychology. I absolutely agree with you. So many times mets have a 90% chance of rain in the forecast, and we see a trace or .25 inches of rain.
I still remember clearly, April 30, 2009. I got home from high school that day and turned on the 4:00pm Local 2 news (like I usually always did). Well, when the weather came on; Frank was talking about how there was a chance of a pop up shower, but mainly south of I-10 and would be nothing to hurt anyone's plans for tonight. He was forecasting in Galveston. His chance of rain for that Friday, April 30 was a 30% chance of hit and miss rain. (NOT STORMS). Well that was also the weekend for my high school's Prom. So I left my house around 5:30-6:00 and while I was leaving Pasadena, I noticed a few flashes of lightning. As I went down 45 South the lightning was still pretty bad, but I didn't think much of it because I thought it would blow over and as the day time heating was wearing off, it would soon die. Little did I know, and I'm sure everyone else, that was the day I won't forget for a very, very long time...
I was in Galveston and I remember eating at iHop and how bad it was lightning in Galveston, but wasn't raining. About that time, my mom called me and told me how she had only been home for 10 minutes from work and she had to leave to go over my grandmoms house (her mom's') to stay over there that night. She called me saying the streets were already flooded, but not real bad in our neighborhood yet, so she was going to try and make the drive over there. She didn't get 1 mile from the house and had to turn around because cars were stranded in water and bayous and ditches came out of their banks. Well, I had to go home that night because I wasn't staying there (in Galveston) that night, because Prom wasn't till Saturday, I just went down there a day before to get some stuff together and have dinner with a few friends. So, at around 9:00pm or so I left Galveston, which was still dry and heading back on 45N. I got around the League City area and it was raining so hard, I could not see the hood of my car. And it was raining so hard, so fast 45 was literally flooded. Like the actual freeway because water couldn't drain off as quick down to the feeder as hard as it was raining. I had to pull over though because I just didn't want to take the chance driving 10mph on 45 and not see anything. Windshield wipers on full blast wasn't doing squat for me. So I got off at a ramp and got onto the feeder, which water I would say was above the curb. I made it to a gas station and parked there for a bit. Rain slowly led up and I got back onto the freeway as things were slowly starting to drain off. Well that was in League City, so I thought things might have been draining off in Pasadena as well. I was wrong. I got to Pasadena and It was another Allison. You talk about major roads that NEVER flood, underwater and cars up halfway on people's cars. Ditches and bayous well out of their banks on Fairmont Pkwy and Beltway 8. It was something I would have never imagined with a "30% chance of rain".

Anyway, sorry this was such a long story, I was just trying to show, that I take 30% chances more seriously than I do 80% chances. I wasn't home in time to watch the 10:00 news, so I didn't get to hear if Frank said anything about how that was such a surprising storm and how it was unexpected. Because it was just that-unexpected. I don't blame him, he put the chance of rain in the forecast, and any meteorologist didn't see that coming. But my car made it fine surprisingly through all of that as I did not want to take my chances to go through any deep water. But man, you talk about a weekend.

That's why I love Mother Nature, she can surprise you at anytime.

If anyone could look up records of rainfall, look up this day. I'm not too sure how to do it... AND I never found out actually how many inches fell that night. So if someone could find that data, I would certainly be interested to know.
I also know we have a few people on this forum that live in Webster, League City, La Porte, Pasadena area as well, so I'm sure y'all remember this storm clearly as well.

[srainhoutx]

Afternoon e-mail from Jeff:

Almost two weeks to the date of the last severe weather event in southeast Texas, the area was dealt another round yesterday. Below is the preliminary storm reports, several locations are being surveyed today to determine if the damage was straight line winds or a tornado.

Caldwell, Burleson Co: Barn damaged and roof/structural damage to house on CR 116

College Station, Brazos Co: Garage door blown in and damage to roofs at the intersection of Hwy 30 and FM 158

College Station, Brazos Co: Brick building wall knocked down near Texas A&M University at Texas Ave and University Dr

Brenham, Washington Co: Tornado (EF0 rating) with winds of 85mph. See below link for damage information.

Somerville, Burleson Co: Winds destroyed tin tire shop on SH 36. Estimated winds of 65mph.

Brenham, Washington Co: Airport AWOS site recorded wind gust to 70mph

Madisonville, Madison Co: barn and tin shed flattened, twisted metal in tree tops at the intersection of FM 1452 and FM 2289. Suspected tornado…survey ongoing.

Madisonville, Madison Co: 18-wheeler on I-45 at mile marker 145 blown over blocking freeway.

Bedias, Grimes Co: Hay barn destroyed, grain silo knocked over and trees down along FM 6096 (possible tornado)

Huntsville, Walker Co: Widespread win damage across the city to trees and power lines. Survey ongoing.

Pinehurst, Montgomery Co: trees downed likely from straight line winds.

Rosenberg, Fort Bend Co: trees and power lines down along FM 360 north of Hwy 90 from strong straight line winds. Winds estimated by radar or 60mph.

Rosenberg, Fort Bend Co: Flash flooding of several streets in the Pecan grove subdivision with most streets impassable. Water was waist deep on some streets.

Pearland, Brazoria Co: Tornado (EF0), peak winds of 65-85mph. See link below for damage path.

Austin, Travis Co: Tornado (unrated) Extensive damage to an industrial park with the tornado crossing US 290 and striking the Walnut Place subdivision. Damage path was 1.14 miles long and 50 yards wide. Photos below from the NE Austin tornado damage.

01262012 Jeff 1 securedownload.jpg (15.11 KiB) Viewed 4990 times

01262012 Jeff 2 securedownload.jpg (31.65 KiB) Viewed 4990 times

Note: The 5.66 inches of rainfall yesterday at Austin Bergstorm Airport was the greatest single day rainfall since 7.04 inches fell on 9-7-2010 during the passage of TS Hermine.

Detailed damage surveys and maps are available on the Pearland and Brenham Tornadoes at the link below:
http://www.srh.noaa.gov/hgx/?n=severe_2012_01_25

Persons in DFW drive around a barricade into high water

01262012 Jeff 3 securedownload.jpg (14.76 KiB) Viewed 4990 times

Below is tow of the three 911 calls of a resident from Haltom City, TX who drive into high water and needed to be rescued:

Caller: "I don't know if I can get out of my car, because there's so much water out there."

Operator: "Just stay where you're at. They'll be there as quick as they can."

The third call comes 20 minutes after the first, as Haltom City fire fighters are tying off and launching a boat into the rushing water.

Caller: "It's Robert Jeffress again. The water is up to my chest. I'm freezing to death out here."

Operator: "They're coming as quick as they can."

Caller: "Okay. I'm going to drown here in a little bit."

Never Drive into High Water!

Excessvie rainfall of 4-6 inches over north Texas has led to significant rises on the upper Trinity River to levels above flood stage at Dallas. A flood wave has been generated on the upper Trinity basin and this water will be moving down the river over the next 1-2 weeks. For the first time in almost a year, Lake Livingston has a positive conservation pool level (or is above 100% capacity). While inflow is still entering Lake Conore from the recent rainfall, this lake remains down almost 6 feet from its conservation pool. Still waiting to see how much inflow is brought into the Highland Lakes above Austin on the middle Colorado basin. Lake Travis was still down over 54.0 ft as of yesterday.

Weather:
Upper level storm responsible for the weather event yesterday is progressing into the MS valley this afternoon with low level stratus breaking up across the region under cold NW surface winds. Fairly quite weather pattern will be in place through the early part of next week as zonal to WNW upper air pattern returns. A cold front will cross the area on Satruday helping to knock temperatures back to seasonal levels for the weekend after hgihs reach near 70 on Friday. Will see a gradual warming trend starting Monday as winds turn back to the SE and Gulf moisture begins to return to the area. Another front appears likely to cross the area late Tuesday or early Wednesday, but mositure return ahead of this feature will be weak and model QPF (rainfall) amounts are on the very low side at the moment. Temperatures will cool down once again by the middle of next week, but still no real cold arctic air intrusion into the state…as the cold air remains locked in Canada this winter. Overall and fairly mild and dry looking 7-10 days ahead.





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[Paul]

well I managed to get over to the tornado scene which is actually less than a mile from my house. I told you guys it smelled EF-0ish out there. This was a very brief touch down then it skipped across the street. Not too much damage. If it was about 500yrds up Hwy35 then Walmart would have got hit and that could have been bad. This was just a gas station and TV repair shop. When I first got over there right after the storm, Pearland PD had basically shut down 35 and I wasnt about to walk to the scene. I was very lucky in that if this storm would have waited about 10 more minutes to drop one it would have been right in my neigborhood.

Never underestimate the power of a tornado. I have seen plenty in 41 years of existence. ON a lighter note, water spouts are fun to be around. IN my younger years, 41 is old BTW, I used to take the bay boat and drive along these suckers. You definetly get wet but it was RUSH....

Paul

[srainhoutx]

A short wave in the southern stream to our SW in old Mexico will slowly move NE today and bring increasing clouds and warmer temps. That feature appears to be strong enough to increase pw's to around 1 inch and could spark a few thunderstorms as it nears the area this evening into tomorrow morning. We will see...



DAY 2 CONVECTIVE OUTLOOK
NWS STORM PREDICTION CENTER NORMAN OK
1249 AM CST MON JAN 30 2012

VALID 311200Z - 011200Z

...NO SVR TSTM AREAS FORECAST...

WEST TO WEST-SOUTHWEST FLOW WILL BE IN PLACE FROM THE FOUR CORNERS
REGION INTO THE MS VALLEY TUESDAY. A BROAD LOW-LEVEL JET EXTENDING
FROM THE OH VALLEY SWWD INTO THE SRN PLAINS WILL TRANSPORT MOISTURE
INLAND ALONG THE COASTS OF TX...LA INTO THE ARKLATEX. MODEL
FORECASTS DEVELOP AN AXIS OF MODERATE INSTABILITY ON THE WRN SIDE OF
THE MOIST AXIS FROM THE TX COASTAL PLAINS NNEWD TO THE WRN OZARKS
WHERE ISOLATED TO SCATTERED THUNDERSTORMS MAY INITIATE TUESDAY
AFTERNOON. ELEVATED THUNDERSTORMS MAY ALSO DEVELOP TUESDAY NIGHT
ALONG THE AXIS OF THE LOW-LEVEL JET ACROSS NRN AR AND WRN TN. NONE
OF THE THUNDERSTORM ACTIVITY IS EXPECTED TO HAVE A SEVERE THREAT
TUESDAY OR TUESDAY NIGHT MAINLY DUE TO WEAK INSTABILITY. ELSEWHERE
ACROSS THE CONUS...THUNDERSTORMS ARE NOT EXPECTED TUESDAY OR TUESDAY
NIGHT.

[Ptarmigan]

San Antonio is in the rain and is moving towards Austin. They should be pleased.

http://radar.weather.gov/lite/N0R/EWX_loop.gif

[srainhoutx]

A healthy shower just moved across my location in NW Harris County...