Updated 915am CT – Wednesday / 06 May 2015

.. Rain and Thunderstorm Chances Continue ..
.. Heavier Rain Possible Again for the Weekend ..

On this Wednesday…. a surface high pressure area is the Carolinas eastward over the western Atlantic Ocean. A trough.. or line.. of surface low pressure extends southward from eastern Colorado and western Kansas into far west Texas and eastern New Mexico. As a result of this surface weather pattern, our local surface winds are south southeasterly.

In the upper levels of the atmosphere.. an upper level low pressure system is over northeastern Colorado with a deepening trough along the west coast of the USA. As a result, our upper air winds at about 18,500 feet are westerly.

After a night of heavy rain in some areas of Travis.. Williamson.. Bastrop and Lee Counties, a more moist air mass continues its hold on the area.

With the broad area of upper air low pressure storm system to our west.. we’ll continue to see weak disturbances being ejected and then moving northeastward across the state of Texas. As these disturbances approach us, we’ll see increased atmospheric lift with increased cloud cover and rain showers and thunderstorm chances through the balance of the seven day forecast period. With the chance of thunderstorms comes the risk of dangerous cloud to ground lightning.

The latest guidance.. from the National Weather Service.. suggests than 2 to 3 inches of additional rain could fall across our area beginning tomorrow through the mid part of next week. I am watching particularly the weekends with the best chance of rain and thunderstorms.. and potential heavy rain.. for Saturday through Sunday night.

Temperatures will be near or slightly below seasonal averages through the next seven days.

Have a good Wednesday….
Meteorologist Troy Kimmel

Contact me:
tkimmel@austin.utexas.edu
http://www.facebook.com/troykimmel