CORPUS CHRISTI, Texas — While remnant moisture from Harold brings isolated showers early today, another disturbance may bring showers and thunderstorms for Saturday, and still more low-end rain chances return Tuesday and Wednesday of next week. Meantime, sweltering heat and humidity moves back into South Texas. A Heat Advisory is in place for this afternoon, with heat index values up to 115 degrees.
The rain chances both Saturday and again next week occur in response to shifting patterns in the upper air. On Saturday, an upper trough in the Bay of Campeche moves west through Deep South Texas, and a few showers from that system may dampen our southern counties. Tuesday and Wednesday of next week, the large upper ridge to our north shifts into the Desert Southwest, allowing a trough to move southward from the Southern Plains and into Southeast Texas. That system will bring a slight chance of rain to our northern counties. Any precipitation will have little impact on temperatures, and rainfall totals will be modest. Afternoon highs return to the upper 90s Thursday through Wednesday of next week, and overnights remain in the middle to upper 70s. Those high temperatures are only a couple degrees above normal for this time of year. Meanwhile, winds will be light.
The tropics have become less active over the past couple of days. Tropical Storm Franklin will move across Hispanola and into the North Atlantic by Thursday, and two disturbances in the open waters of the tropical Atlantic will remain in open waters. In the Eastern Pacific Basin, a disturbance off the southwestern Mexican coast has a high chance of becoming a tropical cyclone by this weekend. It is expected to move northwestward parallel to but just offshore of the coast. Its expected impact on South Texas is negligible.
