Low pressure brings rain | Tropical weather update

Update I'm meteorologist John Dawson, and not just is it Sunday, but it is September. We made it to the 1st of September. And as you probably know, because you've got an interest in the tropics, that's why you're here, checking in with us. This is the peak of hurricane season. The month of September. And we're all we've been talking about this for quite a bit this season that we are looking for a very active September. We'll see how that all pans out. Things have certainly started the season a little bit active, and then we've had some quiet stretch through August. Not unheard of, but just not as active as what we probably would have expected with our forecasted numbers that we have for this season. But when we take a look at the current situation, not a whole lot has changed since the beginning of the weekend. We've got three general areas that we're monitoring. The first one is going to be right off of the Texas coast, and for those of us here in the Houston area, we are certainly paying attention to that, not just because of the tropical implications, but also just the rainy pattern that we find ourselves in. And then we've got a large area here that the National Hurricane Center has identified in this orange shading, pretty much most of the Caribbean, where we could see a potential for some development of a system and then way out in the Atlantic, coming off the coast of Africa. Expectations are that we could see a system. This one is at 20% as far as in a seven day timeframe that we could see development. This orange shaded area is in a 40% and then down even a little bit even lower now to a 10% on that area. That's right off of the coast. So this again for us folks here in Houston, we're paying attention to this at this point. More just in the Rainmaker that it has become for our area here in Southeast Texas. And really, all along the Gulf Coast and even becoming a little bit further inland. We're going to see that in just a minute. But our tropical possibilities are continuing to remain pretty low, only about a 10% chance. So I want to come back out here and focus on this orange shaded area for just a minute, because that's really where the interesting sort of discussion lies at this point in time, the tropical wave that would end up in that orange area is still out here in the Atlantic, a little bit of a ways from the Caribbean still, but this wave is expected to kind of progress into the Caribbean. And I think primarily the situation where we find ourselves and our computer models, I think, are why we're struggling with this a little bit, is that this wave is just not doing a lot. It's what poorly defined. It's not. It's very slowly progressing. And so I think our models are struggling with it just a little bit. But then what the situation is that the Caribbean and we've got some text here that might be a little bit hard to read, but basically all of this orange shaded area is highly beneficial for tropical development. So if something were to get here that's just even close to being tropical and just a little bit of a sense that the expectations are, it would certainly develop into something tropical. And if that something were to get into the Gulf of Mexico, conditions are even more prime for that to possibly develop. So that's why we're certainly keeping a very close eye on this poorly defined tropical wave that's out in the Atlantic, that it's struggling to get into the Caribbean. If it gets there, I think it could develop into something. But there's just so many questions. And this is such a slow development that it's something that just continues to really need to be watched. We could see this in the exclusive Fox model as we watch this sort of again, not a whole lot to deal with sort of situation as we move it through the Caribbean. Here we are on Thursday and this is kind of where that mess is staying, kind of far to the south. And most of our modeling is keeping whatever were to form to the south. So when I showed you the Gulf of Mexico being sort of a prime area, let me be clear. I'm not expecting it to go there, but because of the possibility that it could, we want to make sure that we're kind of keeping an eye on it right now. Expectations are that this would either not develop into much or whatever it develops in would stay fairly far to the south and not get into the Gulf of Mexico. Still, many, many questions to kind of sort through to get there. But that's kind of what we're looking at. Water temperatures very warm right now in the Gulf. And that's helping to contribute to all of that moisture that we're seeing kind of just streaming in. And remember we've got that wide, that broad area of upper level low pressure helping to kind of bring all that in and a little bit of a stalled boundary that's not really doing much, but just giving enough of a area to squeeze out a little bit more of that moisture in the form of that rain. Now, this boundary is going to kind of fall apart a little bit over the next 24 hours. And what that's going to allow is for the shifting of the heavier downpours or where we would expect to find them. So again, for today, for Sunday, here's where the primary concern is for that flooding risk. And it's low. It's just in that one out of four expectations. But when that boundary kind of falls apart, a little bit, then that moisture can make its way even further inland. And then that's why we've got a slight risk or that two out of four threat for some of that flash flooding. This is from the Weather Prediction Center for Monday. And then we'll go ahead and get to day three, which is Tuesday. Expectations remain even higher, further even towards the Panhandle. But we do keep things here along the Gulf Coast as a possibility. And here's some of those numbers. This is rainfall expectations between Sunday through Thursday. Some areas as high as five inches. That's going to be much more defined to the coast. And you'll notice here I'm not going to get super high. You know, we're not going to get focused on Lake Jackson getting the heaviest, but just get the idea that right on the coast, maybe even a little bit more than five inches are possible. And then as we move a little bit further inland, we kind of take that out a little bit further. So back to the bigger picture for the tropical developments. Now that we're in September, these are the primary areas where we watch for named storms be developed. This is in the Atlantic is where we really focus. Now this doesn't mean that they stay in the Atlantic. This is where the formations happen. And then they can continue to move other places. So we could see a storm form out here in the Atlantic and then follow into the Caribbean. It could go into the Gulf of Mexico, or of course, it could go up to the East coast as well. Lots of times when we do see them form up into this region here, these are the ones that stay out in the Atlantic. We like those for sure. Or you know, they also possibly could threaten the East Coast and not the Caribbean and the Gulf. But those are sort of the general areas of where we see some of those forming. So far, we've made it through. Ernesto. Francine is going to be the next name on the list. So we'll continue to kind of keep track. We do expect to see some more named storms, hurricanes, tropical storms happening for the really focused on the September month. So we'll see how that all turns out, especially now that we're here. And as always, a reminder we're here every day of hurricane season. We're on YouTube if that's how you're watching us, we're on Fox26houston.com. And of course, Fox Local is another option for you to check us out as well. And we'