Day #2 of 2023 brings us our first severe storm risk

Mother Nature is off to a fast start this year as far as severe thunderstorm chances go. A level 3 severe weather risk is in place across East Texas and into the Deep South both today and tomorrow, but Central Texas may luck out and miss most of the stormy weather! Rain chances today are near 50% but today’s highest severe weather chances, at least locally, will be pretty much all confined to cities and towns east of I-35. Our overall severe weather risk in Central Texas is at a level 2 of 5 with strong storms potentially containing gusty winds or hail. A tornado or two is possible, but, again, the severe weather risk is relatively low today. A few scattered morning sprinkles or stray showers will turn to a few pop-up thunderstorms near and especially east of I-35. Storm chances will go down around or shortly after sunset since most of the storms will be moving out of our area by that time, but today’s cold front won’t actually push through until, well, tomorrow! The front crosses over I-35 around midnight and that could bring some more scattered rain and storms to cities and towns east of I-35 again. The overnight severe weather risk is very low and we’re mostly just expecting some pockets of heavy rain.

The two rounds of rain today will generally only drop around a quarter-to-half inch of rain, mainly all east of I-35, but there could be some heavier downpours that bump totals to near 1.5″ in some spots. After today’s rain, however, we’re pretty much done with the precipitation until the weekend. Skies stay partly cloudy Tuesday and morning lows in the low 50s will warm to about 70°. Another secondary push of colder air moves in Wednesday and that’ll drop highs into the low-to-mid 60s Wednesday and Thursday. It’ll be a brief drop in temperatures, with morning lows bottoming out in the mid-to-upper 30s Thursday and Friday, before temperatures warm back up again. Near 70° highs return Friday and Saturday, but we’re expecting the overall weather pattern to change and that’ll change our weather leading into next week.

The weather pattern right now is focusing storms toward the West Coast of the United States. While today’s storm system has successfully moved away from the West Coast, the next few storm systems impacting California, Oregon, and Washington will move northward and not eastward through the weekend. After Saturday, however, the storm systems will dig far enough to the south to change the weather pattern and then move toward our area. While there’s a LOT of uncertainty regarding rainfall totals, severe weather chances, and even when the best chance of rain may be, we’re expecting a low chance of rain this weekend to lead to a higher chance of rain early next week. We could see rain linger past next Monday, but rain chances should come down again next Tuesday and Wednesday as we await the next storm system (whenever that may be).

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