Texas Summer 2016

[gboudx]

Update from jeff:

Heavy rainfall threat continues over SE TX today and likely again on Tuesday

Wet weather will continue for much of the week

Upper trough axis clearly evident over SW to N TX this morning with a large shield of rainfall cross much of C and N TX this morning. Locally, bands of showers and thunderstorms are moving northward off the NE Gulf of Mexico into our western counties from Matagorda Bay to near I-10. Radar has really shown an increase in development in the last hour along what appears to be a convergent boundary rom Galveston Bay WSW to central Brazoria and central Matagorda Counties.

Air mass remains extremely moist with CRP morning sounding showing 2.43 in PW and LCH 2.16 in. Areas east of a line from College Station to Galveston are seeing some breaks in the overcast this morning and this will likely result in an expansion of the showers and thunderstorms ENE across more of the area as the day progresses.

Storm motions are certainly faster with deep southerly flow in place, but this same flow is favorable for storms to band in lines and potentially train over the same areas piling up rainfall. With such a moist air column in place rainfall rates of 2-3 inches per hour remain possible under the stronger storms. Will favor the SW/W counties for the bulk of the rainfall and potential training today, but the threat does remain across the entire region.

Little change in the air mass moving forward with very moist profiles remaining in place much of the week. It is not going to take much if any heating to get things going especially on Tuesday. The pattern may transition to more diurnal in nature toward the end of the week as moisture decreases a bit and the air mass requires more heating to fire off convection.

[Brent]

I think August has left the building... 73 degrees and raining at 11am...

[TheProfessor]

Here's this guy's first winter speculation, don't know much about him ( https://www.wxrisk.com/1st-speculation- ... 2016-2017/ ). It seemed to be geared mainly to the east coast, but he does talk about just about the whole country. It seems to think right now that the cooler weather will mostly held in the Northeast in the first half of Winter and then thinks that any weak La Nina that might have developed will have weakened and that stronger Greenland blocking will allow for the colder air to slip further south and allow for the Plains and the East Coast to experience more of Winter.

[Ntxw]

Here's this guy's first winter speculation, don't know much about him ( https://www.wxrisk.com/1st-speculation- ... 2016-2017/ ). It seemed to be geared mainly to the east coast, but he does talk about just about the whole country. It seems to think right now that the cooler weather will mostly held in the Northeast in the first half of Winter and then thinks that any weak La Nina that might have developed will have weakened and that stronger Greenland blocking will allow for the colder air to slip further south and allow for the Plains and the East Coast to experience more of Winter.

He makes some great points. I actually disagree on some points though. I think the SE ridge will be in play and at times poke northeast. -PNA will be most prevalent of the past 2 winters as it is a staple of Ninas. Midwest and Northern plains centric trough. NAO has been stubborn positive since 2011. All eyes on the EPO. This winter more or less could look similar to 2013-2014 than 2014-2015

[Brent]

August 15th in Texas

This Afternoon Showers and possibly a thunderstorm. High near 79. Southeast wind around 5 mph. Chance of precipitation is 90%.

[TeamPlayersBlue]

Here's this guy's first winter speculation, don't know much about him ( https://www.wxrisk.com/1st-speculation- ... 2016-2017/ ). It seemed to be geared mainly to the east coast, but he does talk about just about the whole country. It seems to think right now that the cooler weather will mostly held in the Northeast in the first half of Winter and then thinks that any weak La Nina that might have developed will have weakened and that stronger Greenland blocking will allow for the colder air to slip further south and allow for the Plains and the East Coast to experience more of Winter.

He makes some great points. I actually disagree on some points though. I think the SE ridge will be in play and at times poke northeast. -PNA will be most prevalent of the past 2 winters as it is a staple of Ninas. Midwest and Northern plains centric trough. NAO has been stubborn positive since 2011. All eyes on the EPO. This winter more or less could look similar to 2013-2014 than 2014-2015

I agree that the -EPO will be the main story here. That warm pool is already showing i believe what could happen this winter with a persistent 5H in the Bering Sea. I think the placement of the high is crucial but right now it favors a -PNA. If it shifts to the east a bit, could repeatedly bring down some big time cold down.

Was it 2014-15 where we had some of the biggest high pressures on record come down but that kept moving east?

[Ntxw]

2013-14 and 2014-15 were similar in both had -EPO. 2013 was cold neutral while 2014 was warm neutral. 2013 centered the cold in the plains, 2014 was further east in the northeast (Boston saw 100+ inches of snow from mid Jan to March). Difference was PNA, 2013 -PNA and 2014 +PNA with the weakish Nino.

[weatherdude1108]

Love love love!

000
FXUS64 KEWX 151941
AFDEWX

Area Forecast Discussion
National Weather Service Austin/San Antonio TX
241 PM CDT MON AUG 15 2016

.SHORT TERM (Tonight through Tuesday Night)...
A nice August rainfall event continues across much of South-
Central Texas with the bulk of the activity remaining across the
eastern two-thirds of the area. The rainfall has kept temperatures
in the middle 70s which could break records for the lowest high
temperatures for Mabry, Bergstrom, and San Antonio. Any breaks in
cloud cover though could allow temperatures to quickly rise. The
atmosphere remains very saturated with precipitable water values
near 2.4 inches across the eastern CWA with lesser values in the
west. An upper level trough axis continues to slowly move through
the Southern Plains this afternoon. The subtropical high to the
east and another to the west is allowing this trough to move
slowly which is sustaining the large scale lift across the area.
At 850 mb there is a trough axis nearly bisecting the CWA with
southerly flow to the east of the trough. In addition, a stalled
boundary at the surface is also helping to enhance shower
activity. Most of the precipitation will continue to be east of
the 850 trough and along and east of the surface boundary and will
continue to have the higher PoPs for these locations. Some of the
model guidance is progging the 850 trough to slightly move east
this afternoon before moving farther to the west by midnight. This
will keep the higher chances of rain tonight mainly east of an
Eagle Pass to Llano line.

Rain chances are expected to be high once again tomorrow as all
the previously mentioned features remain nearly stationary through
the afternoon. Again, the bulk of the heavier activity will be
east of that Eagle Pass to Llano line where the highest
precipitable water values are located. Much of the CWA has already
received 1-4 inches with some isolated higher amounts across
portions of the area. The rainfall has been nearly perfect as
hourly rain accumulations have been generally less than a half an
inch per hour which has allowed for very little impacts other than
minor flooding. However, if we do see any heavier downpours
tonight or tomorrow afternoon, the grounds will be nearly
saturated and there could be a threat for slightly more flooding
concerns. Because of this, have opted to extend the Flash Flood
Watch through 7 PM on Tuesday. Do not anticipate widespread flash
flooding, but there could be Flash Flood Warnings needed. As has
been the case the past several nights, there should be somewhat of
a break early Tuesday night before some additional activity will
be possible across much of the area with the higher concentration
once again in the eastern counties.

&&

.LONG TERM (Wednesday through Monday)...
By Wednesday, the stationary boundary should have already surged
back to the north leaving us with southerly flow once again.
However, with a weakness aloft, PWs remaining above 2 inches and
adequate surface heating, we should still see scattered to
numerous showers and storms on Wednesday and Thursday afternoons.
Moisture values are expected to drop off by Friday and thus we
should see less of a coverage of activity. There is a threat of
another widespread rain event by Saturday and Sunday as another
trough passes through the Central Plains. This system is expected
to be somewhat similar to the current system with a boundary
stalling somewhere over Texas. Will increase PoPs to 20 to 40
percent for now for the weekend before lowering them slightly for
Monday.

[gpsnowman]

A "cool" 75 degrees here in Frisco this afternoon. I wonder if any record high minimums will be set today in the DFW area. Above normal seems to be the norm from month to month. Time for below normal to strike back!!

[Brent]

A "cool" 75 degrees here in Frisco this afternoon. I wonder if any record high minimums will be set today in the DFW area. Above normal seems to be the norm from month to month. Time for below normal to strike back!!

Yep the heat crowd has had their time... it's time for revenge.

Hope it continues into the fall and winter

[Ntxw]

The daily low max is 75 I believe but DFW had a high temp shortly after midnight at 80. The afternoon high got to about 78F which is -17F below normal. Let me tell you something though, earlier today the dewpoint was above 70 with actual temps about 76-78 and it felt amazing. People up north and east complain that they have more humidity and that it feels horrible, they clearly have not lived through a Texas summer. 100F and 65dp feels way worse than 75-80 with 70+ dews.

[Ptarmigan]

In case you havent checked, below Alaska and just to the southwest we have a massive warm pool, highly anomalous (with blocking overhead) in the same area as what started in 2013.

That warm pool did come back despite El Nino. That warm pool usually causes ridging over Alaska, which is a negative East Pacific Oscillation (EPO).

[jasons2k]

Looking at satellite, radar, and the PW maps, it could be a very long and wet night across SE Texas. PW continues to rise as moisture streams north, and there are PW values as high as 2.6" now showing up in the Gulf east of Brownsville.

[Brent]

Winter is coming... August has been cancelled. Amarillo barely makes 60 for an afternoon high in August... DFW in the 70s.

[weatherdude1108]

The high was 74 degrees at my house yesterday, on August 15th,...in TEXAS.


Inches of Rain at the abode:
Today - 0.55 (so far)
Yesterday - 3.19
Sunday - 0.48
Saturday - 0.41
Total since Saturday (so far) - 4.63

Adds up, but has mostly soaked into the dry ground because of the slower rate, saturating it instead of running off and washing away stuff. Perfect!

I am OVER AND DONE WITH the DOG DAYS of TEXAS SUMMER.

[Ntxw]

Pretty confident 100s are over for the year. Real summer is probably over too. The rest of August should be fairly active and below normal. If 1983 is any example look for an early fall front earlier in September.

Early signs from climate models and analogs suggest winter starts early this year with December signal being 180 from last year, cold. The cold neutrals, and weak first year Nina Decembers can be quite frigid most recently 2013.

[TeamPlayersBlue]

2.15" in last two days here. .54" so far today. More rain to go.

[Ntxw]

Euro is a great pattern for continued threats of fronts and rain chances. Looks like we have broken the late summer rut of the past few years of lingering too long.

[jasons2k]

Another 1.25" here today, bringing my storm total to 5.3".

[aggiecutter]

Take the L out Lover and summer is over: