HOUSTON – While Houston and SE Texas will see a very cold end to the week, we’re not looking at striking the snow globe sweepstakes twice this winter
Buckle Up! More Arctic cold is coming:
Mid to late February usually brings a wide variety of weather for SE Texas and this year will be no exception.
While temps got to near 80 on this past Saturday, we’re already tracking another arctic air plunge that will push temps back down to sub-freezing by Thursday morning.
We’re expecting a chunk of that arctic air shown above to invade behind a cold front on Wednesday that will drop temps down into low 30s across much of metro Houston and even colder, upper to mid 20s across most of our northern and western counties for Thursday morning!
Factor in the wind Thursday morning which will be blowing in from the northwest, and it’ll feel icy cold!
So why no snow?
The short answer is, the three main ingredients (cold air, moisture, lift) that we needed last time to get our amazing snow day in January are what is called, “out of phase” this time. Check out the placement of the cold front and low pressure system that ushers in the cold for us on Wednesday:
In January, we had the most important ingredient, the icy cold air was already here before a storm system brought a bunch of rain/sleet/snow into SE Texas. This time, the juicy air is well to the east of us before the cold air arrives. That means, yes, you will still likely need to cover sensitive plants and make sure the pets have some shelter from the wind, but as far as snowmen, we’re going to (hopefully) wait until next winter!
If you want a slightly deeper dive into the players of this quick mid-week cold snap, check out this video from the KPRC2+ Livestream at 9am:
