BROWNSVILLE — Rain will be sticking around into next week, according to National Weather Service Brownsville, which is good news for dry Rio Grande Valley counties.
Meteorologist Chris Birchfield said there will be a 20-40 percent chance of rain over the next six days. The U.S. Drought Monitor on Wednesday classified most of Cameron, Hidalgo and Starr counties as experiencing a moderate drought while Willacy County was considered abnormally dry.
“We are in a pretty clear drought across the area, and a lot of areas need the rain because it’s starting to brown out there,” Birchfield said. “It’s looking like we’ll have a chance of rain each day (for the next week), but it’ll be normal sea breeze-type showers you get in the fall.”
He said Thursday’s rain was caused by a disturbance aloft in the atmosphere and tropical moisture, though it wasn’t related to Tropical Storm Gordon’s landfall in Alabama this week. Adding to that the sea breeze and Brownsville had “well above normal moisture,” Birchfield said, but widespread flooding was not expected.
A wind shift heading for South Texas could also give the area a better chance of rain next week, but it’s still unclear if it will reach the Rio Grande Valley, he added.
“Hopefully, some of the rainfall will provide relief from the heat because we’ve been above normal throughout the summer,” Birchfield said.
