Freezing in Houston!

[Yankeegirl]

Hey you all fellow Houstonians... Check in and let us all know of how cold it gets in your neck of the woods tonight!

[cctxhurricanewatcher]

Hey you all fellow Houstonians... Check in and let us all know of how cold it gets in your neck of the woods tonight!

We are suppose to hit the 32 (the airport NWS Office) mark in Corpus, but I bet we hit the upper 20's in my part of town.

Adios, Mosquitos!

[PTrackerLA]

We're already at 35 and its only 6:15 PM! Mosquitos enjoy your last hour lol. We'll bottom out tonight somewhere between 25-27 and I think we'll be below freezing by 8pm.

[jeff]

Still a little wind this evening 3-8 mph. Dewpoints have recovered some from the bone dry 13 and 17 earlier this afternoon with full mixing. Surface pressure have fallen some from 30.72 to 30.60 now, but winds are still north. Looking at the RUC it appears the massive high drifts just N of the area overnight with very weak ESE flow developing after midnight. This could temper the freeze across the area by a few degrees depending on when this happens.

Temp dropped 8 degrees in the last hour. Looking for 25-28 tonight, will base the temp on KIAH (house is roughly a mile or so from the airport).

Very intersting looking middle to late next week for TX and the S US based on middle range guidance, critical thickness, and and RH profiles.

[Yankeegirl]

Welcome Jeff... Havent see ya here beofe! I am near Katy and its 45 out now, and its only 6:39... Im about to spark up the fireplace!

[WhiteShirt]

Very intersting looking middle to late next week for TX and the S US based on middle range guidance, critical thickness, and and RH profiles.

Tell us more about the interesting part! Could we have some snow next week?

[JenyEliza]

Hey you all fellow Houstonians... Check in and let us all know of how cold it gets in your neck of the woods tonight!

We are suppose to hit the 32 (the airport NWS Office) mark in Corpus, but I bet we hit the upper 20's in my part of town.

Adios, Mosquitos!

Mosquitos? I wanna know if those stinking love-bugs are gone? THAT infestation you have there is the most disgusting thing I've ever seen!

Try explaining that to little kids who've never seen flying bugs---doing the birds and bees.

[Yankeegirl]

My thoughts exactly White Shirt!!!

[jeff]

Very intersting looking middle to late next week for TX and the S US based on middle range guidance, critical thickness, and and RH profiles.

Tell us more about the interesting part! Could we have some snow next week?

Looking at the overall pattern set up with a cutoff upper low retrograding WSW into the PAC and a large building ridge deep into the PAC NW and Alaska with strong downstream low heights over the central and eastern US. Both the EURO and to some degree the GFS show the trough extending deep into the Gulf and even the Greater Antilles. It appears the first shot early in the week will head more toward the SE and E coast, but then the pattern amplifies even more with deep NNW to N flow from Canada to TX which is supported by NCEP to a degree.

The interesting part is the potential for short waves within the NW flow to produce periods of precip over the southern plains and southern US with the cold air in place. Looking at the GFS 300mb forecast shows the southern branch well to the south over the GOM with the polar branch with more control over the US. This leads me to believe anything that falls will be more frozen instead of freezing as the short wave will come from the NW and not the SW (ie little overrunning warm air advection above the surface for TX). The main caveat and it is a big one is moisture availablity. My fear is that with a cold air mass in place and no return flow from the Gulf, the system may pass with little more than a mid level deck. However, if the system is strong enough, good UVM could squeze out any moisture that is available even if dewpoints are in the 20's.

I agree with the overall model trends, but the timing and intensity of the short waves, moisture, and cold air will make the difference as to if we have clear and cold or cold and something else.

My experience with the GFS is that it forecast well at 14 days then goes through many changes and flip flops between 13 and 5 days and then begins to trend back to the original 14 day solution by days 3 and 4. I personally along with a few other mets do not believe the model can handle cold air plunges along the front range of the Rockies due to the resolution (grid scale) of the global model and the rapid topography ascent over a short distance which tends to dam the cold air and send it south faster and stornger.

Will await the next runs and see what flip flops they have in store.

JL

[sertorius]

Jeff:

Excellent discussion-Thanks!! I actually live in the Central Plains-Lawrence, Kansas(30 miles west of Kansas City) and have been following (hey I'm really a history teacher so I really haven't much of a clue!!) this cold air for about a week-the gfs has flipped flopped and is not nearly as cold as what it was showing 2 days ago-but the Euro is still showing a pretty good push by next Friday with 500 hts below 5400 over me. I guess we will have to be patient-Nobody here is really talking any real cold weather and I figure that is because it is too far out (I would think they would if for no other reason than boredom with the current weather!!) Thanks again

[LAwxrgal]

Wowzer Jeff...are we talking Dec 89 here?

[Yankeegirl]

Well here on the west side of Houston it only got down to 32 over night... Actually its 32 out right now.... I guess it was too breezy to make it any colder....

[vbhoutex]

Well here on the west side of Houston it only got down to 32 over night... Actually its 32 out right now.... I guess it was too breezy to make it any colder....

Same here at the house in Spring Branch. didn't see any breezes though. I guess the high is moving East faster than anticipated and we got some warmer air coming back in because it was dropping for the mid 20's at the rate it was going.

[JenBayles]

Wowzer Jeff...are we talking Dec 89 here?

Lord I hope not! My husband and I love to fish in the Gulf, and if I remember correctly, 1989 was the year we had a big fish kill in the Galveston Bay system. Unusually warm weather to start, and then a MAJOR cold snap. The fish didn't have time to get to the deeper and warmer water. Took 2 or 3 years before we caught any decent sized reds or trout.

[Yankeegirl]

Ive been hearing alot about this year being like 1989 as well... I wasnt here in 1989, so I cant say I remember it... Although my uncle was, and he said it snowed that year...

[CajunMama]

It's 26 here right now and I pray it gets up in the 50's

[JenyEliza]

It's 26 here right now and I pray it gets up in the 50's

23 degrees in NW Atlanta suburbs.

[jeff]

SE TX lows this morning:

Hooks: 27
Bush IAH: 29
Hobby: 36
Conroe: 23
Sugarland: 32
College Station: 29
Brenham: 25
Huntsville: 26
Palacios: 31
Lake Jackson: 30
Bay City: 31
Galveston: 41

My goodness does next week look interesting.

[southerngale]

Some more Southeast Texas lows based on Weatherbug stations in the area...just a tad east of you, Jeff.

My low here was 27° - brrrrr!


Beaumont - 26°
Lumberton - 27°
Kountze - 24°
Sour Lake - 24°
Orange - 28°
Silsbee - 29°
Winnie - 25°
Port Arthur - 31°
Nederland - 29°
China - 28°
Bridge City - 30°

[WhiteShirt]

My goodness does next week look interesting.

How interesting?