textproduct: Austin/San Antonio

KEY MESSAGES

Updated at 553 AM CDT Fri Jul 10 2026

- Not as hot today as tropical moisture and a chance of convection moves inland.

- Daily rain chances could lead to cumulative heavy rainfall totals over 3 inches by Tuesday.

SHORT TERM

(Today through Saturday) Issued at 137 AM CDT Fri Jul 10 2026

A minor dust plume moved through the area Thursday and will be more diluted today as a surge of tropical moisture moves inland. A broad and somewhat chaotic region of instability is over Mexico and the western Gulf and a pair of small mid-level eddies are moving north into South TX and will raise PWat values along and east of I-35 into the 2.0-2.3 inch range by 00Z Saturday.

With the mid-level pattern being chaotic, there isn't much confidence on timing, amounts and location of the best chances, and no one model looked to have a better handle on the PoPs than the others, so we opted for a slight bump off the model blend, giving more areas coverage, while tamping down some of the higher PoP values where we could. Today's better chances are predictably favoring the Rio Grande Plains, San Antonio area, and Coastal Prairies where the inland moisture deepens first. Then the rest of the Short-Term forecast looks aimless and we'd assume daytime PoPs should be 15-40 percent and nighttime PoPs being slightly lower. There was however a slight agreement among models to show enhanced rain chances near the Rio Grande after 00Z Sunday.

LONG TERM

(Saturday night through Thursday) Issued at 137 AM CDT Fri Jul 10 2026

Saturday night's boost in rain chances out west is a reflection of the mid levels showing a better organized cyclonic shear axis that extends NE out of Mexico where a broader low pressure circulation continues. The 00Z 7/10 run of the GFS depicts a local maxima of PWat values around 2.2 inches around Eagle Pass.

Meanwhile a large northward surge of the subtropical ridge into the Northern Plains states leaves a broadening region instability over TX. N/E winds in the mid levels begin to pool moisture into an E-W axis over N TX and shift it slowly southward Sunday night into early next week. This is why the highest PoPs of the week are centered Monday into Tuesday. If we were to take the model consensus of the last couple deterministic GFS/ECM runs, we might see some daily rainfall amounts topping an inch in spots through the weekend and then some potential pockets of 1 to 3 inch downpours Monday and Tuesday. Our Storm total QPF value look appropriate for this relatively wet period with values below both the GFS and ECM totals for the 5-day period. We might guess most areas should see over 1/2 inches of rain over 5 days while maybe half the forecast area gets locally heavy storm totals in the 1 to 3 inch range over the same period.

There is a concern that this is too aggressive with some PoPs in the likely category, mainly the northern counties. The reason for the concern is that an even stronger Saharan Air Layer (SAL) plume is forecast to arrive onto the TX coast Monday. How far inland this plume gets and how much impact it could suppress convection in a high PWat environment will be interesting to track. If the PWat rich period Monday and Tuesday asserts its will on the area, we may need to think about some possible heavy rain and flooding concerns. On the other hand, we could also oversell the rain chances (as we try not to outguess the model data too much), and the later model runs show lowering rain chances. Either scenario is possible, so perhaps we'll need another day or two of model trend analysis to get a better handle on which is more likely. The dust modeling tools would suggest the upcoming dust plume is both stronger and larger, so eventually, the unsettled pattern should wane, and this is reflected in the lowering of PoPs for Wednesday and beyond.

AVIATION

(12Z TAFS) Issued at 553 AM CDT Fri Jul 10 2026

Overall, no significant changes have been made to the latest aviation forecasts. We could still see some low clouds develop around sunrise, but will likely stay VFR along I-35, with some TEMPO MVFR cigs expected at DRT. We held off on the mention of any TSRA for SAT and SSF as the latest guidance shows only isolated coverage here, with better coverage over the coastal plains. South winds remain gusty during the late morning through early evening period at all TAF sites.

PRELIMINARY POINT TEMPS/POPS

Austin Camp Mabry 95 77 95 77 / 20 10 20 20 Austin Bergstrom Intl Airport 94 77 94 77 / 20 10 20 20 New Braunfels Muni Airport 93 75 94 75 / 40 20 30 20 Burnet Muni Airport 93 74 93 74 / 10 10 20 20 Del Rio Intl Airport 95 76 93 75 / 10 20 40 70 Georgetown Muni Airport 95 76 94 77 / 10 10 20 20 Hondo Muni Airport 91 75 91 74 / 30 30 50 50 San Marcos Muni Airport 94 76 94 76 / 20 20 30 20 La Grange - Fayette Regional 94 77 95 77 / 30 10 30 10 San Antonio Intl Airport 91 77 92 77 / 50 20 40 30 Stinson Muni Airport 92 77 92 77 / 50 20 50 20

EWX WATCHES/WARNINGS/ADVISORIES

None.