A low-end threat for a brief/weak tornado will continue along the Southeast Texas coast through the afternoon hours. The primary focus for this severe weather outlook will be in the southwestern Texas Panhandle, West Texas, Permian Basin, eastward into the Concho Valley and Big Country. Those regions are where the Storm Prediction Center have outlined the “standard” level 2 risk of severe weather. Midland, Lubbock, San Angelo, and Abilene are a few of the larger towns included. A “marginal” level 1 risk includes the Hill Country, North Texas, and most of the Texas Panhandle. Dalhart, Amarillo, Childress, Wichita Falls, D/FW, Killeen, and Fort Stockton are a few of the larger towns included. We’ll likely see thunderstorms start developing in eastern New Mexico by 3 PM CT. Those storms will tend to move southeast into West Texas by 5-6PM. Eventually we may see a squall line or cluster of storm organize by the evening hours. That cluster would move southeast toward the Big Country and Concho Valley tonight. Discrete storms this afternoon may produce hail up to the size of two inches in diameter or a bit larger than the size of a golf ball. Localized damaging wind gusts up to 70 MPH are also possible. Once storms congeal into a squall line or cluster the threat for damaging wind gusts up to 75 MPH will tend to be the primary concern, but hail up to the size of golfballs may still be possible. The tornado threat is very low today thanks to almost non-existent low level shear, but the threat is never zero when dealing with severe storms. The line of storms may approach Interstate 35 after midnight but should be weakening.

Here is a simulated radar output from the HRRR model through this evening. It shows the scenario described above fairly nicely. Keep in mind that this model probably won’t have the locations/timing down exactly right, so expect the actual radar to look different later on. I do expect we’ll have some fairly significant straight-line winds this evening in the Big Country and Concho Valley as that squall line comes surging in, so keep an eye out.