Tornado Watch this afternoon, Freeze Warning tonight
HOUSTON, Texas (KTRK) -- A Tornado Watch has been issued northeast of Harris County for potential rotating storms this afternoon as a cold front moves through. Montgomery, Liberty, San Jacinto, Walker, Polk, Trinity, and Houston counties are all under a Tornado Watch until 6PM.
A line of storms along a cold front will bring the potential for some strong and severe storms, especially northeast of the Houston area. It'll turn windy and much colder Sunday evening.
All of Southeast Texas is under a Freeze Warning from Midnight to 9AM tomorrow.
What can we expect as the Arctic cold front passes Sunday afternoon?
The cold front will bring us scattered showers and thunderstorms for Sunday. Right now we have a 80% chance for showers and storms, especially during the afternoon. We can't rule out a couple of strong to severe storms but it looks like an isolated risk. Also, the instability parameters look lower than what we experienced with last weekend's severe weather, so we are NOT expecting a repeat of last weekend. More than likely, it would be more of a straight line wind and hail threat, but isolated tornadoes are possible.
Just how cold will it be behind the Arctic cold front?
Temps will fall from a high of 77 Sunday afternoon to the middle 40s by 9pm Sunday evening. And it'll be very windy Sunday evening as well so please have a thick jacket and a hat it you'll be out. Next week will feature the coldest temps so far this winter with lows in the 30s and highs in the 40s. Feels like temps Monday morning could fall to the upper teens for a short time. It's looking more likely that a good portion of SE Texas will drop below freezing sometime next week.
Is a hard freeze possible, and could we get any frozen precipitation?
Our Freeze Warning is from Midnight through 9AM Monday, and for most the expectation is for a Light Freeze, not a hard pipe-bursting freeze. A Hard Freeze is possible in Trinity, Madison, and Houston Counties. As far as wintry precipitation goes, it now appears that our northern counties will have a very small chance of some ice Thursday morning if the rain starts early enough. Temps may be below the freezing mark for a short period of time north of a College Station to Lake Livingston line. At this time it doesn't look like the metro Houston area will see any ice but we'll keep an eye on it. Also, a major winter storm is possible over the northern part of the state Thursday into Friday. If you're planning to head to Dallas then, you might be dealing with ice and several inches of snow.
13 ALERT RADAR MAPS:
Montgomery/Walker/San Jacinto/Polk/Grimes Counties
Fort Bend/Wharton/Colorado Counties
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