The Weather Blog

Happy New Year!

From Brad and I, we hope you have a wonderful New Year! Be safe and have fun while ringing in 2008! :)

Ringing in 2008 With a Big Chill !!

It has been relatively cool with seasonable temperatures over this past week.

After a mild afternoon on Monday, temperatures will begin to fall as a strong, Canadian front plows through East Texas.

This cold front will affect a good portion of the country as some of the coldest weather this winter season to date will arrive. 

While most of the bitterly cold air will stay off to our northeast, we will still feel a glancing blow of this Canadian chill.  The leading edge of the cold air will begin to move in late Monday afternoon into the evening hours.

Once the front blows through, winds will pick up out of the north at 20 mph, with higher gusts.  This will make for a windy and cold New Years Day.

Afternoon highs on Monday will be near 70 degrees.  By New Years Day, however, our daytime highs will be some 20 degrees cooler as we struggle to make it out of the 40's.  And even though our highs will be below normal, it is our overnight lows which will pose the biggest bite of cold air.

We will see several nights of subfreezing temperatures with Wednesday and Thursday mornings being the coldest in which overnight lows will bottom out in the low to mid 20's.

Rain Tonight but a Nice Weekend

Look for another wet start to the day on Friday as our next storm system approaches. This event will be like Wednesday morning so take the umbrellas with you. The rain should come to an end from west to east by the afternoon. The weekend should be awesome! It will be cold in the mornings with a light freeze expected Saturday morning. The afternoons should be great with sunshine and temps in the 60s. As for New Years, get ready for a glancing shot of cold, arctic air. More on that later...

Merry Christmas

I would like to wish each and everyone of you a Merry Christmas and safe holiday season.

I have enjoyed tracking Santa Claus with our Live Doppler 9 Network.  It's pretty amazing how powerful Doppler Radar really is.  After all, we just don't pick up showers and storms, but we have the capability to pick up insects, bats, aircraft, and that's right, even Santa.

I will be heading back to The Woodlands for Christmas.  I am thankful that I will be off tomorrow and can spend the rest of the week with my family and closest relatives.

As I depart, Conley Isom will be here tomorrow and guide you through the rest of your week.

On behalf on Conley and me, Merry Christmas !!

First Day of Winter

Today was officialy the first day of winter.  Typically, the first day of winter occurs on December 21st or 22nd.  This year, it fell on the latter of the two days.

This day is also known as the "Winter Solstice."  This is when the sun is directly over the Tropic of Capricorn in the Southern Hemisphere at noon.  Of course, that makes sense considering it is summertime in the Southern Hemisphere, while we are experiencing the winter season.

This does not mean the sun is farther away from us, but rather, the tilt of the earth is aligned such that we receive less sunlight. 

The Winter Solstice not only implies the start of the winter season, but it is also the shortest day of the year.  We had only 10 hours and 8 minutes of daylight today with sunrise at 7:13 this morning and sunset at 5:21 this evening.

Starting tomorrow, each day will get just a little bit longer until we hit June 20, 2008, when we hit the "Summer Solstice."

Merry Christmas!

I will be traveling to see my family this Christmas but will return on Christmas Day. I want to wish everyone a Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays. Thanks for watching KTRE! -- Chief Meteorologist Conley Isom

White Christmas?

It did snow on Easter across East Texas, so snow on Christmas cannot that be hard...

Unfortunately, we are not looking for a white Christmas this year. However, it will be cold and maybe a little wet. There are a series of upper level disturbances that will race across the southern Plains over the next 7 days. The first will bring us more storms Saturday, followed by colder temperatures. The second will come in Christmas Eve but temps look to stay well above freezing. The third is scheduled to arrive on Wednesday, the day after Christmas. This one might, key word there is might, bring snow to northern parts of East Texas, so around Tyler/Longview. Not for us here in Lufkin/Nacogdoches. Timing may change between now and then so keep it tuned to KTRE for the latest!

Mars Makes an Appearance

If the clouds can break up tonight, you will be able to see Mars in the night sky.    It is scheduled to make its closest appearance to Earth until the year 2016. 

Mars will be the brightest object in the sky tonight, shining at a distance of 55 million miles from planet Earth.

While you may be able to view it with the naked eye, a telescope will offer the best view.  Mars will have a distinctive red color as it will be in the eastern skyline shortly after sunset this evening.

The close proximity has to do with the elliptical orbits of the planets around the sun.  This is one of those rare times due to the elliptical orbit that it will get this close to Earth.

Hopefully, you will have a chance to check it out.  If the cloud cover can break up and thin out, then you will have a better view of Mars.

This image and some content courtesy of:  Space Weather.com

Early Boomers Give Way to Cold Weather

Were any of you awoken from your sleep early this morning?  I know I was. 

A line of strong storms rolled through East Texas around 5-7am this morning, depending upon where you live. 

These storms contained heavy rain, gusty winds, and lots of lightning. 

This is an image of what the storms looked like early this morning on our Live Doppler 9 Network.  Based on this radar image, you can tell that these storms meant business.  The best news is that no widespread severe weather was reported and most of us ended up getting 1-2 inches of rain with this system as it moved on through.

As fast as the storms came in, they quickly moved out.  Now we have the cold weather to deal with as it finally won out in the battle of the airmasses.

As the cold air settles in tonight, we will see temperatures around here bottom out in the low 30's, with a few of you briefly touching the upper 20's.  Notice, however, that the Panhandle and North Central Texas will drop down into the teens and low 20's tonight.  I don't know about you, but that is some cold stuff.

We will not just see one night of freezing temperatures as Monday morning looks to be even colder in parts of East Texas as many of us will drop into the mid and upper 20's for a span of several hours.

This is due to a large area of high pressure settling into the state.  As it moves overhead on Sunday night, it will allow our winds to relax and become calm.  Anytime you have a high pressure system directly overhead, it allows your temperatures to really bottom out as all the heat at the surface is allowed to escape into outer space. 

The bottom line is get those blankets out and furnaces ready to go.  You will need them the next two days as Old Man Winter makes a return.

More Ice/Snow for Oklahoma and Northeast

The drastic changes in our local weather will continue through the weekend, but our weather is nothing to complain about compared to what is happening to our friends off to the north.

This past weeks ice storm has crippled many residents across Oklahoma.  With many still without power, many residents have been foreced to leave their homes and take shelter with neighbors or other relatives who have electricity.

Just as things seem to be looking up for many of our close friends up to the north, there is more bad news ahead.  Another winter weather event will be unfolding in the next day or two as another storm system gathers strength and brings in more frozen precipitation along with colder temperatures by the weekend.

It is this next system which will give us a good chance of rain late tomorrow and into early Saturday. 

Fortunately for us, we will not have any winter weather to contend with, just rain showers. 

After the area of low pressure brings us cold weather for the weekend, it will then track up the eastern seaboard bringing  blizzard-like conditions to the northeast United States.  They are expecting anywhere from 8-12 inches of snow and lots of travel delays by Sunday.

Images Courtesy of:  Accu Weather