March Ends As One Of The 'Wettest' March On Record

[Ptarmigan]

Boy howdy, ain't gonna lie. It looks like this front coming in next week is gonna have some elbows on it!

A strong cold blast in March is rare.

[srainhoutx]

AREA FORECAST DISCUSSION
NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE HOUSTON/GALVESTON TX
1007 AM CST SUN MAR 1 2015

.UPDATE...
MORNING FORECAST UPDATE.

&&

.DISCUSSION...
LATEST SFC ANALYSIS HAS A COASTAL LOW OFF MATAGORDA BAY ALONG THE
UPPER TX COAST. THERE APPEARS TO BE TWO BOUNDARIES OF CONCERN. THE
FIRST HAS PUSHED MORE INLAND AND SEPARATES AIRMASS WITH TEMPS IN
THE 40S FROM AIRMASS WITH TEMPS IN UPPER 50S TO LOW 60S. SECOND
BOUNDARY IS THE TRUE WARM FRONT WHICH SEPARATES THE UPPER 50S/LOW
60S FROM THE UPPER 60S/LOW 70S WITH DEWPOINT TEMPS IN THE UPPER
60S AS WELL. THE 12Z CRP AND LCH SOUNDINGS CAPTURE THE COOLER
BOUNDARY LAYER AIRMASSES NORTH OF THESE BOUNDARIES. ONE GLARING
DIFFERENCE IS THE CRP SOUNDING SHOWS AN ELEVATED MIXED LAYER AND
CAP AT 700MB WHERE LCH DOES NOT. THIS MEANS LIFTING AN ELEVATED
PARCEL WOULD RESULT IN CONVECTION AND REASON WHY THERE HAS BEEN
SOME ISO TSRA BETWEEN HOUSTON AND BEAUMONT. SUSPECT THE EML WILL
ADVECT OVER SE TX MORE IN THE COMING DAYS AND LIKELY BE A FACTOR
IN THE FORECAST WHEN THE STRONG COLD FRONT COMES WED. UNTIL THEN
MAIN CONCERNS WILL BE HOW/WHEN/WHERE WARM FRONT PUSHES
NORTH/STALLS AND THEN PUSHES NORTH AGAIN THROUGH TUE. TEMP
FORECAST WILL BE VERY CHALLENGING. ONLY CHANGES TO THE FORECAST
THIS MORNING WERE FOR TEMP TRENDS AND RAIN CHANCES.

EARLY LOOK AT 12Z MODEL RUNS...NAM IS SIGNIFICANTLY SLOWER WITH
FROPA ON WED. GFS HAS BECOME MUCH MORE WET BEHIND THE FRONT ON WED
INTO THUR. WED NIGHT FORECAST WILL BE AN INTERESTING ONE.

[Heat Miser]

Boy howdy, ain't gonna lie. It looks like this front coming in next week is gonna have some elbows on it!

A strong cold blast in March is rare.

And very depressing.

[MontgomeryCoWx]

Heck yes! Delay the inevitable heat in HELLston!

You heat misers will have your hell soon enough. I actually enjoy 4 seasons.

[nuby3]

I'm with you moco. I think this looks promising

[Karen]

What does next Saturday look like? Need to drive into Louisiana not sure if there will be precip with the cold.

[BlueJay]

I am hopeful that we will not experience temperatures in the 20's for multiple hours. Those sub-freezing temperatures do a number on some of the foliage. My azaleas are budding now!

[texoz]

The temp forecasts here in Austin must have been challenging lately because there have been some 10+ degree busts over the last week.

[don]

Fwiw the 18z gfs shows snow/sleet as far south as Harris County

[Kludge]

Fwiw the 18z gfs shows snow/sleet as far south as Harris County

I'm hoping for a MAJOR bust on this forecast... but I realize that never happens. /sarc

[Paul Robison]

NOAA says:


TEMPS BEHIND THE FRONT WED NIGHT SHOULD DROP VERY QUICKLY. TEMPS
IN THE 30S ARE EXPECTED THUR MORNING. FREEZING TEMPS EXPECTED AT
ABOUT THE TYPICAL BRENHAM...CONROE...CLEVELAND LINE NORTHWARD.
THIS IS WHERE THE FORECAST GETS INTERESTING. WINTER IS NOT QUITE
OVER YET. WED NIGHT INTO THUR THE UPPER LEVEL LOW OVER CALIFORNIA
BEGINS TO MOVE ACROSS THE S ROCKIES AND SHEAR OUT WHILE PHASING
WITH AN UPSTREAM SHORTWAVE OVER THE C PLAINS. WHERE THERE IS NOT
MUCH LARGE SCALE ASCENT FROM PVA...JET STREAM BECOMES FAVORABLY
POSITIONED WITH THE RIGHT ENTRANCE REGION OF THE JET OVER MUCH OF
C AND E TX. THERE WILL BE QUITE A BIT OF LIFT THROUGH DIVERGENCE
WITH THE JET CORE. FRONTOGENETIC LIFT WILL ALSO SUPPORT PRECIP
DURING THIS TIME. THIS MEANS THAT THE THUNDERSTORM CHANCES WITH
THE FRONT COULD TURN INTO A WINTRY MIX BY THUR. BTW THUNDERSTORM
CHANCES FOR WED LOOK SUSPECT AS INSTABILITY WILL BE LIMITED AND
THERE SHOULD BE A DECENT CAP FROM THE ELEVATED MIXED LAYER. BASED
OFF GFS BUFR SOUNDINGS AT KCLL...AREAS NORTH OF THE FREEZING LINE
OUTLINED ABOVE WILL HAVE A CHANCE FOR A MIX OF RA/FZRA/IP. IF SUB
FREEZING LAYER DEEPENS AND THERE IS MORE SATURATION ALOFT NEAR
-10C LEVELS AND ABOVE...MAY SEE MORE OF A TRANSITION TO SLEET THAN
FZRA. BUT AT THIS TIME LOOKS LIKE THERE WILL BE A SLOW TRANSITION
FROM RA TO FZRA TO SLEET AS PRECIP ENDS THUR. THE GFS HAS MUCH
MORE PRECIP THAN THE ECMWF BUT STILL ENOUGH TO KEEP AN EYE ON
ICE/SLEET TOTALS. AT THIS TIME DO NOT THINK THERE WILL BE ENOUGH
FOR ANY SIGNIFICANT IMPACTS BUT IT USUALLY DOES NOT TAKE MUCH
AROUND HERE FOR AN IMPACT.

BTW:

FOG REMAINS IN THE FORECAST FOR MONDAY...AND DENSE FOG ADVISORIES
MIGHT BE NEEDED. FOG MAY RETURN EARLY TUESDAY AS SOUTHEASTERLY
FLOW RETURNS. A STRONG COLD FRONT IS EXPECTED TO MOVE THROUGH THE
AREA ON WEDNESDAY. IT WILL BECOME BREEZY AND COLDER BEHIND THE
FRONT. IF ENOUGH MOISTURE LINGERS AND TEMPERATURES GET COLD
ENOUGH... SOME FROZEN PRECIPITATION COULD DEVELOP ACROSS THE
NORTHERN PARTS OF THE AREA GENERALLY NORTH OF A LINE FRONT FROM
COLLEGE STATION TO HUNTSVILLE TO LIVINGSTON LATE WEDNESDAY NIGHT
THROUGH THURSDAY MORNING.

If you live in the areas the forecaster (in bold) has just mentioned, stay tuned.

BTW: I have to be somewhere Thursday morning. I'm not going to have to wrestle with any snow or sleet, am I. (I'm in Houston metro area, if anybody's interested)

[nuby3]

So there won't be much in the way of thunderstorms with the front then, since there isn't going to be a lot of instability. I'm betting on some sleet pellets mixing in Thursday morning

[Paul Robison]

So there won't be much in the way of thunderstorms with the front then, since there isn't going to be a lot of instability. I'm betting on some sleet pellets mixing in Thursday morning

Will that cause Houstonians any problems? Sleet? Could someone elaborate on wind gusts for Wednesday-Thursday period?

[nuby3]

They said they are not expecting enough of sleet or ice to cause any issues, but to be paying attention anyways just in case because people here don't know how to handle it. Wind gusts will be enough to move a flag around a bit. May need wind advisories near the coast. Nothing out of the ordinary

[redneckweather]

Agreed. I wouldn't expect much, if anything down here in the form of frozen precip. It will pretty much be like last weeks front. Probably identical in terms of temps and a cold drizzle/rain. Hopefully this arctic front will be the last one.

[srainhoutx]

Morning briefing from Jeff:

Cloudy, cool, and damp sums up the weather across the area this morning…and for much of this week.

Coastal surface trough continues to plague the area with fog and drizzle north of the trough and much warmer spring like temperatures south of the boundary. This feature pushed inland yesterday allowing Pearland and Angleton to reach the upper 70’s while Sugar Land remained in the 50’s and College Station in the mid 40’s. Overnight this trough axis and pushed back southward into the coastal waters with north winds in place across the entire region and temperatures running in the 40’s and lower 50’s. Not expecting much warm up today under drizzle, fog, and cloud cover. Warm air advection over top of the surface cold dome will keep the dreary weather locked in place all day.

Big changes transpire on Tuesday…for the best day of the week weather wise! Coastal warm front will rapidly surge inland flooding the area with mild air. Dewpoints and temperatures will sharply rise with the frontal passage with dewpoints pushing into the upper 60’s and temperatures the mid and upper 70’s. Warm dewpoints over the cold nearshore waters will likely result in dense sea fog formation. Drizzle and showers will move out of the area with the warm frontal passage and skies may even scatter out south of the warm front and north of the coastal sea fog bank.

Even bigger changes arrive on Wednesday. Another strong arctic cold front will plow across the region Wednesday afternoon resulting in rapidly falling temperatures. High temperatures in the 70’s will fall quickly into the 40’s and 30’s by evening. Freezing line will quickly advance into the region Wednesday night. Air mass ahead of the front will be moist, but likely capped off by warm mid level temperatures. Not expecting much in the way of severe weather given the warm sector air mass will likely have widespread cloud cover and little heating. Rain chances certainly increase with the frontal passage and continue into the post frontal air mass…which leads to the next concern.

Wednesday night/Thursday morning:
Strong arctic front will have moved into the Gulf of Mexico by Wednesday evening with strong cold air advection driving temperatures into the 30’s over much of the area. Strong winds will likely require wind advisories for at least the coastal counties with gust possibly up to 40mph which will drive wind chills into the 10’s and 20’s. Rain chances will linger behind the front as moisture overruns the surface arctic dome. Surface freezing line will move into the area Wednesday evening and likely reach as far south as a Brenham to Cleveland line (sound familiar). Light rain may change over to light freezing rain early Thursday across the northern 1/3rd of the area. Forecast soundings show mainly a freezing rain P-type, but might suggest some sleet mixed in also especially from College Station to Huntsville. Right now it appears the freezing line will remain north of Harris County and the precipitation will remain liquid. This air mass is certainly very cold and adjustments will likely be needed over the next few days.

Thursday-Sunday:
Yet another storm approaches from the SW US with the cold air locked in place. Temperature should warm safely above freezing, but it will continue to be cold and miserable with increasing chances for widespread drizzle, fog, and rain. Lows will range from the 30’s to highs only in the 40’s Thursday and Friday. In fact many locations may see highs only in the 30’s on Thursday. The late week forecast will likely have some additional adjustments in the coming days as the latest GFS has backed off greatly on the amount of rain in the weekend time period.

[Heat Miser]

Yes, it sounds very, very familiar, Jeff. Felt great here yesterday in N/W Galveston County. So glad we have yet another cold front and drizzle to look forward to.

[Portastorm]

Models pretty much coming in line now regarding a significant and potentially dangerous ice/sleet event for Austin from Wednesday evening into Thursday. Models showing 0.10-0.25" of freezing rain followed by lighter amounts of sleet. Should that verify, it would likely shut down the town at least for a day.

I would expect that EWX would be issuing Winter Storm Watches in the next 12-18 hours.

[srainhoutx]

The latest 12Z MOS text data suggests freezing rain switching to a rain mixed with some snow at IAH early Thursday morning. Glad you folks along the Coast warmed up yesterday. It never got above the mid 50's N of I-10 yesterday.

[BlueJay]

It's still not warming up! We are currently at 52F. I was looking forward to it being a bit warmer today.