textproduct: Lubbock

KEY MESSAGES

Issued at 1200 AM CST Mon Feb 9 2026

- Critical fire weather conditions in the extreme southwestern Texas Panhandle this afternoon.

- Unseasonably warm this week, around 10 to 20 degrees above normal.

- Precipitation chances return Tuesday afternoon, then again Thursday night into the weekend.

SHORT TERM

(Rest of tonight through Monday night) Issued at 1200 AM CST Mon Feb 9 2026

Quiet weather will continue through the early morning hours into early afternoon with upper ridging and relaxed surface gradient dominating. A surface low will develop across eastern Colorado by late morning/early afternoon in response to an upper shortwave trough moving across the Central Rockies into the Northern Plains. The surface low will progress southeastward through the day and will be followed by a cold front. This surface low will help to tighten the surface pressure gradient as it moves closer to the FA, allowing for breezy afternoon winds. The southwesterly nature of the surface winds will allow for warm and dry conditions with afternoon highs reaching into the 70s on the Caprock and 80s off the Caprock with afternoon relative humidity dropping into the low to mid teens. Coupled with ERCs in the 70-90th percentile, this will create elevated to near critical fire danger. The highest fire danger will be across our northwestern zones where wind speeds will be highest and RH will be lowest. While Red Flag conditions will be marginal at best, it is enough to warrant upgrading the current Fire Weather Watch to a Red Flag Warning. A RFD will be issued for the rest of the FA. Surface winds will begin to decrease by sunset as the surface low moves into western and central Oklahoma. The cold front will begin to push southward across the northern Texas Panhandle by sunset, entering our northern zones Tuesday by sunrise and south of the FA by noon.

LONG TERM

(Tuesday through Sunday) Issued at 1136 AM CST Sun Feb 8 2026

Occasionally wet with unseasonably warm conditions look to be the main message of the extended forecast package. By the start of the period, the stubborn upper ridge will have begun shifting eastward in response to an approaching cutoff low from central Mexico. Unfortunately, global models are still not handling the evolution of this system as well as we had hoped leading to a low confidence forecast still in regards specifically to precipitation chances Tuesday. As it stands, the ECMWF continues to be the quicker and more northern model track compared to the GFS and NAM solutions that have come in slower and slightly more southerly in track. Regardless, one thing all three solutions seem to have in common is that the core of the H5 jet will be positioned south of the FA, limiting the overall large scale ascent associated with this system for the region. Nonetheless, flow aloft (from H8 to H5) will prevail out of the southwest and aid in moisture transport into the region through mid-week. Additionally, southerly surface flow will also be working in tandem with flow aloft to drawl in moisture from the Gulf into the FA, with guidance hinting at a tongue of theta-e stretching into portions of the Caprock regions Tuesday afternoon and evening. Given most large scale ascent looks to be positioned south of the FA, lift for precipitation chances will come from Tuesday's FROPA and weak isentropic ascent noted at the 305K level. Depending on what track this system takes, will determine how much precipitation is expected, but given the recent model runs there has been an increase in confidence for PoPs across our area compared to this time yesterday. In fact, MOS guidance has nearly tripled for PoPs Tuesday afternoon along with ensemble guidance now highlighting larger probabilities for at least 0.01" of rainfall. Therefore, will go ahead and maintain widespread NBM mentionable slight chance to chance PoPs for the Caprock regions with the highest chances fixated across our most southern row of counties where better forcing and moisture will reside. We will quickly dry out mid-week through the end of the week, as the system ejects to the northeast and upper level ridging begins to build back in. However, ensembles are hinting at the weekend bringing renewed chances for more beneficial rainfall as an upper level low over the Desert Southwest approaches the Panhandle region Saturday. NBM seems to be hinting at the potential for precipitation chances beginning as early as Thursday evening as subtle perturbations ahead of the trough track through, although this will be determined by the amount of moisture return possible before then. Will go ahead and maintain NBM mentionable PoPs beginning Thursday through Saturday, but this will likely need to be adjusted in future forecasts as this event gets closer and confidence increases.

As for temperatures, unseasonably warm will be the main theme as previously mentioned as the FA remains positioned beneath an upper level ridge for most of the period. The exception will be for Tuesday into Wednesday and towards the weekend as a pair of upper level lows track into the region. Nonetheless, above normal climatological means geopotential heights are expected to continue leading to daily afternoon highs in the 60s and 70s for much of the week. Wednesday and Friday look to be the "coolest" days of the week, which will be in part to a pair of cold fronts swinging through the region on Tuesday afternoon and then again late Thursday evening into early Friday morning.

AVIATION

(06Z TAFS) Issued at 1200 AM CST Mon Feb 9 2026

VFR conditions will prevail.

FIRE WEATHER

Issued at 1200 AM CST Mon Feb 9 2026

Widespread elevated fire weather danger will exist today across the region with areas of critical fire danger in the far southwestern Texas Panhandle. 20-foot winds will increase to around 10-20 mph during the afternoon as warm temperatures help to drop minimum relative humidity to the low to mid teens. As fuels are relatively dry, this warrants for the current Fire Weather Watch to be upgraded to a Red Flag Warning with a Rangeland Fire Danger statement for the rest of the area.

LUB WATCHES/WARNINGS/ADVISORIES

Red Flag Warning from noon to 7 PM CST Monday for TXZ021-022-027.