A new severe thunderstorm watch is now in effect through 9 AM for Central Texas, the Brazos Valley, the Coastal Plains, Southeast Texas, the Piney Woods of East Texas, the Golden Triangle, and the Upper Texas Coast. While the watch runs through 9 AM, it will be canceled from north to south as the squall line continues to push south this morning. Austin, San Marcos, Columbus, Brenham, Bay City, Houston, Galveston, Lake Jackson, Beaumont, and Jasper are a few towns included within this watch. The strongest storms within the squall line continue to produce damaging straight-line winds of 60 to 70 MPH. We haven’t heard or seen any 75+ MPH reports in a while, so that’s good. Large hail is continuing to occur within stronger storms as well. Hail sizes are generally staying between dime and quarter, but isolated golf-balls can’t be ruled out.

Thunderstorms as a whole continue to move south/southeast at 30 to 50 MPH. Not all storms are severe and not everyone in the watch will be impacted by large hail or damaging winds. However, all storms are producing frequent/continuous lightning and heavy rainfall. Flooding isn’t too likely since the storms are keeping a good pace and not sitting over any one area for an extended duration of time.

06Z HRRR: Simulated weather model radar from 4 AM to 9 AM today. Use for a general time-line guide, not a ‘when will it storm exactly at my location.

Thunderstorms will be moving south into the Houston metro by 6 AM. Some storms may still be severe with damaging winds. Storms will move off the coast shortly thereafter and we should be done with all severe thunderstorms by 8 AM or 9 AM.