NorthHillsWx

Looks like RDU made it at least to 101

Nope it fell apart just before reaching here, nothing but some mood drops. We blew the top off the thermometer today, topped out at 101.8!!!

Currently 100 with a dew point of 72 giving me a heat index of 110… Brutal doesn’t even describe this well enough

This week's drought monitor showed some more slippage in northern NC with an expansion for D3 and the reintroduction of D4 in the Triad area. Meanwhile the drought was again chipped away at the mountains and coast. Elsewhere in the south most areas remained unchanged but south of ATL has been dry lately and saw the reintroduction of moderate drought after a long break from it. Rest of Ga and SC were mostly unchanged

2010 was I think the hottest summer on record for Raleigh. I was in school at Clemson so I did not get to experience that here, thankfully

Yep. From ChatGPT: 2026 Raleigh Heat Metrics At-A-Glance (Year-To-Date) Days over 90°F: 65 days Days over 95°F: 33 days Days over 100°F: 6 days

RDU did hit 100. We maxed out at 98.8 at my house, but will say the trusty car thermometer was reading over 100 and got up to 103 on the beltline pretty much my whole drive back from the office until I got into my neighborhood. I'm sure some localized areas were well over 100. Feels like walking through a bowl of hot soup this morning. This is one of the most brutal summers I can ever remember living here. Just no real extended relief from humidity since June and no sign of real fall-like weather though Sun-Tues will be a decent reprieve

Key to all these is RI or last minute organization right before LF. Great examples. I think S FL gets some brown ocean effect simply due to the swampiness/ever present water of that part of the state. Wilma and Katrina are other examples of storms that did not weaken over S FL.

Couldn’t you say that about every tropical system though? And the brown ocean effect here was what supposedly kept the circulation intact, enhanced the rain that this speaks to. So this is saying the storm caused the brown ocean effect but how was it able to sustain long enough for that to happen? Also, surface temps (and what the rain water temp would be) during the heaviest rainfall were in the mid to upper 70’s, below what would be sufficient for tropical processes. This to me is lazy. There are other processes here

Not sure we’re gonna crack 100 today, haven’t been able to get above 98 and clouds have moved in. Sauna out regardless

It’s been said but my goodness if this system had another day over water this might’ve been a major

It could be to an extent but this whole region is in some level of drought, so it would be highly unlikely a moist environment exists on the ground outside of what the storm has produced. I think more likely this is a function of an extremely unstable environment, low shear, and proximity to gulf moisture. This area has been known historically for producing similar occurrences of systems maintaining longer than expected so there might be some regional geography/proximity to the gulf that factors in for adequate moisture transport with minimal elevation to disrupt a surface low. Very very impressive storm, did not think we’d still be talking about this system much today

Some of the rates reported have rivaled Harvey (8”+ per hour) but thankfully the duration will not be near as long and obviously the size of the system is much more compact. Just another TS reminding us that wind speed isn’t always what should be the most important messaging about TS impacts. This one caught meteorologists off guard as pretty much everyone forecast a rapid decay of the circulation and no one mentioned 20”+ amounts that we are now seeing. Some 30” totals seem likely as 25-27” have already been reported with rain continuing, This is going to be a very memorable system for the areas impacted.

Over 20” in places now, flash flood emergency issued

Mesonet Station FW9014 in Livingston Texas just reported sustained TS winds at 39 mph with gusts into the mid 50s in the remnant core Meanwhiloe Livingston Reservoir is reporting a sustained wind of 46 mph! I think the downgrade to TD came way too early based on these current observations of at least TS conditions

Based on radar and some of the wind observations today with the highest gusts being recorded inland from port Arthur, Nederland, to Beaumont, it seems almost likely the storm continued to strengthen for a period after landfall, contrary to NHC estimates

90 mph gust reported earlier in port Arthur: https://x.com/mattdevittwx/status/2094914628283224102?s=46&t=NyKvXvI1o-sJQb-68mmo4g

Beaumont gusting to 69 mph! This thing still packing a punch

Beaumont currently sustained around 45 gusting into 50’s. Impressive for a 60 mph land falling storm Edit: Beaumont just gusted to 58

Nederland, TX (inland from port Arthur) has been reporting gusts to 70 mph

I was involved in a caveat from last season…

Texas point topped out at 50 kts sustained with gusts to just below hurricane force, 62 kts (71 mph). This storm was likely 1-2 hours away from hurricane intensity based on the rapid organization at landfall

Now 46 gusting to 59 kts at Texas point, exceeding operational intensity. That’s a north wind coming off the land too. Higher velocities still offshore. To me this is easily a 55 kts system

Sustained at TS winds of 35 kts gusting to 48 kts at Texas Point right now. Calcasieu Pass also registered gusts to 46 kts recently Edit: Now sustained near 40 kts at Texas Point. Probably a 50-55 kts system being highest velocities are still offshore and we are already close to observing operational intensity on a land observing site

This storm looks like a hurricane on radar now. I know it's not one but that isn't a bad radar presentation at all. Definitely more easterly shear than NHC has mentioned though, it cannot wrap convection upshear despite numerous attempts