Flooding event escalating a bit in the Southwest with eyes on interior Texas tomorrow night through Friday

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In brief: Heavy rain is causing widespread instances of flash flooding in the Southwest. This is likely to expand into Colorado, the southern Plains, and west or central Texas tomorrow and Thursday into Friday. The Atlantic tropics remain uneventful. We may see that change in a week or so, but it’s too soon to say what that could mean.

Good evening to everyone except the Atlanta Braves and Chicago White Sox. (Your author is a Phillies and Astros fan)

Let’s see where we are with the ongoing rainstorm in the Southwest and Texas, and we can talk tropics as well.

Polo Remnant Rain

A lot of rain has fallen over the last day and a half or so in the Southwest and parts of Texas. We’ve seen as much as nearly 5 inches of rain southwest of Tucson.

Radar estimates a widespread 1 to 3 inches across Arizona and New Mexico, with numerous flood advisories and flash flood warnings as of early Tuesday evening. (WeatherFront)

We have our first “emergency” of the event, as a small portion of Doña Ana County in New Mexico near Rincon is at risk of severe flooding due to a levee breach.

Rincon, NM is under a flash flood emergency, as a levee has breached near the water treatment plant. (WeatherFront)

Rincon has seen nearly 6 inches of rain this month, almost half of which has fallen in the last 48 hours.

The entire region remains under a moderate risk (level 3 of 4) for excessive rain tonight. That shifts north and east some tomorrow, but still, portions of eastern New Mexico could see some heavier rainfall, as model forecasts are on the order of 2 to 6 inches or more, depending on which model you look at. The tropical and convective (thunderstorm) nature of this rain is such that localized areas can easily receive 1 to 3 inches of rain in a couple hours, which is when the risk of severe flooding increases.

Rainfall from this evening through Wednesday evening as forecast by the REFS ensemble, showing a widespread 1 to 3 inches. There will likely be areas with higher amounts, particularly in the higher terrain of northern New Mexico, southern Colorado, or in central and northern Texas and Oklahoma. (WeatherFront)

The highest risk of those more squirrely amounts would be in southeast Colorado or northern New Mexico. You can see those pockets of oranges showing up on the map above in those areas.

A moderate risk of flash flooding includes Pueblo, southeast Colorado, and extreme northern New Mexico on Wednesday. (NOAA)

For Texas, the situation is a little trickier. A slow-moving line of storms is going to move from West Texas into Central Texas tomorrow night, and as it does, locally torrential rain will occur. The good news is that it’s been relatively dry here late this summer. The bad news is that anytime you add 3 to 6 inches or more of rainfall in a short time, flooding can occur. This is the challenge tomorrow night and Thursday morning in parts of Hill Country.

A moderate risk of excessive rainfall for tomorrow night is in place across most of Hill Country into the western fringe of DFW and north through central Oklahoma. (NOAA)

If we look at the probability of any location seeing 5 inches or more of rainfall, what I would deem to be a more serious flash flooding threat, you can see a bullseye showing up near or south of San Angelo. Don’t zero in too closely on the exact location of this bullseye, as it’s going to be a fluid situation. But you can see those odds creeping up to 80 percent or higher. This mean that somebody, likely between Del Rio and San Angelo and west of Kerrville is going to see 5 to 10 inches of rain tomorrow night, likely to trigger some flash flooding and, locally, some serious flash flooding. The same holds true north and west of Fort Worth.

The odds of 5 inches or more of rain tomorrow night are highest in southwestern parts of Hill Country, as well as north and west of Dallas and south of Oklahoma City. (WeatherFront)

On Thursday night and Friday, this risk will shift east into the I-35 corridor to include DFW, Waco, Austin, and San Antonio. I think the risk is a little more isolated on Friday than it looks tomorrow night, but there is at least the potential for some locally torrential rainfall. And, indeed, a moderate risk for flooding exists on Thursday night/Friday AM too.

A moderate risk of flooding covers the urban corridor of Central Texas for Thursday night and Friday. (NOAA)

Bottom line: Folks in Texas, Colorado, New Mexico, and Oklahoma should be prepared for locally significant flash flooding tomorrow through Friday.

For the Houston area, check out Space City Weather for the latest on how this weather will impact that area, as we don’t expect quite the significance of flooding risk there that we see to the west.

Atlantic tropics remain futile

The eighth named storm of the docile 2026 Atlantic hurricane season formed yesterday, with Tropical Storm Hanna forming east of Bermuda. It heads out to sea and will weaken. Tropical Storm Fay’s on again/off again relationship with tropical storm intensity blossomed again yesterday only to end today. Now, Fay is officially a post-tropical cyclone, with the final advisory issued this evening.

Tropical Storm Hanna should dissipate soon in the North Atlantic. Fay is officially dissipated now in the open Atlantic. (WeatherFront)

Fay managed to rack up only 3.8 units of ACE, despite 39 advisories, which has to be close to a record for futility. That represents 40 percent of the Atlantic’s ACE to date, which should finally breach 10 units tonight. Compare that to a normal value of 95 ACE units by October 1st.

Over the next week, things should remain quiet. It continues to appear like the southern or eastern Gulf will get a little more active in about 7 to 10 days, but we continue to have no real specific read on what disturbance it would be, where it would come from, etc. It’s basically an uncorroborated threat that we will continue to monitor for now and update on by Friday if it becomes more material. At the least, I would expect to see a potential uptick in heavy rain risk in Florida in a week or so.

Nor’easter winds down as attention focuses on Southwest & Texas drenching from remnants of Polo

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In brief: Our nor’easter is winding down over the Northeast, so we take a look at some challenges this storm posed and some stats. Next, our attention shifts to Arizona, New Mexico, and Texas where significant rain may produce serious flooding in some areas, particularly north of I-10 from Arizona through Texas and west of I-35 in Texas, back toward Hill Country and in the DFW Metroplex.

Nor’easter wrapping up

This nor’easter was interesting, both in terms of how it unfolded and how it was perceived ahead of time. Most nor’easters do have an element of disparity that’s usually measured in variable snow totals or which part of the coast sees the highest winds & waves. This one had quite a dramatic disparity both in terms of where the strongest winds occurred, the most power outages occurred, the worst tidal flooding occurred, and even where the heaviest rain fell.

Estimated rain totals for the storm through early Sunday evening. (WeatherFront)

For coastal New Jersey, this was a bad event, full stop. Some of the worst tidal flooding those areas have seen in some cases almost since Hurricane Sandy in 2012. In every community, there are places that “typically flood” during storms like this. Having grown up outside Ocean City, NJ, I recall this vividly. However, this flooded a lot of places that don’t usually flood.

I’ll speculate that this was worse than perhaps anticipated in Jersey partially because tides and coastal flooding had been occurring for a couple days prior to the nor’easter forming, as well as the full moon. That’s me thinking out loud.

For Long Island, it was a solid moderate to locally major flooding event. For New England, it was a locally moderate event but mostly minor.

The heaviest rain, as expected, did fall south of Boston and east of Providence. A strong credit to the models for zeroing in on that days in advance and sticking with it. Correctly.

What was more interesting to me were the threads of disparity in terms of qualifying how bad a storm this was going to be. We tried to emphasize the coastal flooding aspect of things here. Our Thursday post emphasized that the flooding could be substantial in the back bays of Jersey and Delaware. That seems to have been correct, and it was also being emphasized by local NWS offices ahead of time. We did say on Thursday that “While this shouldn’t be a historic tidal flooding event by any means, it’ll be notable for the region.” That may have been a little bit underdone (while not a top 3 event in most cases, this did crack the top 5 to 10 in some locations).

But in some cases, folks were describing this as a historic storm, as if everyone from Delaware through Massachusetts was going to experience equally bad effects. A mutual follower here in inland Connecticut even messaged me asking why their apartment complex was saying the storm was historic. One thing I learned living in Houston for 14 years was that nuance matters in big events. A lot. A really awful storm for someone could be an absolute nothingburger for most other people. Threading that needle is difficult to message, and I’m not sure the overall perception of the storm here accurately conveyed that nuance.

Also, the only thing particularly abnormal about this storm was the calendar. Nor’easters like this don’t usually happen in September. They have in the past, of course, and they will happen again. But it’s not usually typical this early in autumn. There’s been a lot of conjecture about this storm being tropical potentially (including from us, though we said there was a chance, but that it would probably fall short) and conjecture about climate change “supercharging” the storm. As someone who supports climate change science and invoking it at times where it’s very clearly evident, I just don’t know if this was the right event for that sort of discourse. Though I suppose sea level rise making moderate flooding verify as major flooding or something like that is a valid discussion point. Because that is happening. Whatever the case, that’s my “get off my lawn” commentary today.

Polo rainfall risk

Hurricane Polo is back to a category 3 storm this evening.

Hurricane Polo this evening southwest of Baja. (WeatherFront)

Polo will turn northeast tomorrow and move ashore in Baja and then into mainland Mexico by the time we get to Tuesday morning. From here, copious amounts of moisture will surge into the Desert Southwest and eventually the Southern Plains and Texas. The first big concern will occur tomorrow night and Tuesday in Arizona and New Mexico. Here, precipitable water levels, or the amount of available moisture in the atmosphere will skyrocket to about an inch above normal, which is very strong for this part of the country. Not everyone in these areas will see copious amounts of rain, but there will be portions of Arizona and New Mexico that will be at risk for severe flash flooding.

A moderate risk for excessive rainfall is posted for the Four Corners and much of Arizona and New Mexico north of I-10. (NOAA WPC)

The Weather Prediction Center has hoisted a moderate risk for both Monday and Tuesday in the Desert Southwest, mainly north of I-10 in anticipation of numerous reports of potentially significant flash flooding. This is a very dynamic setup, so we could see some areas pick up as much as 3 to 6 inches of rainfall, while others do a half inch to an inch.

(NWS Albuquerque)

There is potential that we see Tuesday get upgraded to a “high risk” of excessive rainfall in New Mexico. The Southwest has actually seen quite a bit of rain this September, so the combination of saturated grounds and a top-end moisture event coming through is a recipe for serious flooding risk. I don’t want to overstate things, but this may be the most serious tropical system related impact in the Continental U.S. this year. Folks in the Southwest will want to monitor this event closely and be ready to act. If you can contact anyone who may be backpacking or vacationing, they should also know this is a potentially serious event.

Keep an eye on this in the Texas Panhandle as well. Speaking of…

Texas & the Plains

Beyond the Southwest, the situation gets even more complex in the Plains. The moisture from Polo and a slow or stalling cold front will probably focus repeating rounds of rain from Hill Country into North Texas. Those areas are already under a moderate risk (level 3/4) for flash flooding on Wednesday, and that will likely extend into Thursday as well.

Excessive rainfall and a serious flash flooding risk exist in Texas and parts of Oklahoma Wednesday and perhaps Thursday. (NOAA WPC)

Rain totals are likely to end up in the 4 to 8 inch range from south of San Antonio through Dallas and perhaps up toward Durant, OK through Friday. There is a chance that some areas see as much as 10 to 12 inches though, as we know Texas flood history is littered with these types of remnant Pacific hurricane events.

Rain totals through next weekend as currently forecast by NWS. Adjustments and locally higher amounts are likely. (Pivotal Weather)

Folks in Houston that read our site will want to follow Space City Weather for the latest. Eric or myself will keep you posted, but for now the more serious flooding concerns are likely to stay north and west of the Houston region. Texas folks in Hill Country and the Metroplex should monitor the next couple days of forecasts very closely and be prepared for disruptions on Wednesday and Thursday.

Elsewhere

Fay continues in the Atlantic, while Gonzalo has mercifully dissipated. Another area northeast of Bermuda has about a 60 percent chance of developing over the next couple days before dissipating. Otherwise, it remains calm.

Atlantic satellite image showing Fay and the potential next storm to its north, no threat to land. (WeatherFront)

Other than that, Hurricane Nolo has moved away from the Hawaiian Islands now and will skirt west of them over the next couple days, bringing rough seas.

Nor’easter continues into tonight and Sunday with locally heavy rain from New Jersey to Massachusetts

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In brief: The nor’easter off New Jersey and New England is mostly doing what we thought had been expected, with gusts as high as 70 mph in spots and some major tidal flooding. More wind, rain, and high tides to come into tomorrow. Meanwhile, we also check in on Gonzalo and Fay, Polo’s flooding risk, and the latest in Hawaii.

Here in my backyard in Connecticut, I think it’s safe to say this nor’easter has flopped. It’s not terribly far off what I expected here, but it also really has not been a big deal. The same cannot be said everywhere, however. A classic case of your mileage may vary.

Wind

Maximum wind gusts have been notable in some areas.

Maximum wind gusts so far today greater than 50 mph. (NOAA)

The leader in the clubhouse appears to be Block Island which registered a 71 mph gust. Next to that we have Barnegat Light on the north end of LBI in Jersey that hit 70 mph. Harvey Cedars peaked at 69 mph just south of there. Off the map, Wellfleet on the Cape in Massachusetts hit 70 mph also. And there was a 68 mph gust at Brandywine Shoal in Delaware Bay. For NYC Metro, the peak gust appears to have been Oakland Gardens in Queens that hit 57 mph and JFK Airport which did 53 mph. There was also apparently a 64 mph gust in Midtown Manhattan, but I suspect that was on a high rise.

So I mean, the wind basically did what we expected it to do. I do think we’re past peak wind now for today at least. There could be another round of gusty winds tonight on Long Island or the Jersey Shore as the storm center passes nearby. I would expect mostly 50-60 mph gusts from that at peak, but don’t be surprised if the storm escalates again overnight in those coastal areas.

Tidal flooding

In terms of tidal flooding, there was a good deal of moderate to locally major flooding reported this morning around New York City and Long Island tidal gauges.

Major tidal flooding was reported in Nassau County near Freeport. (NOAA)

Same story on the Jersey Shore and in Delaware. In fact Lewes, DE on Delaware Bay fell just 1 foot short of their record tide.

Major flooding in Lewes, DE this morning. (NOAA)

This will rank as the 7th highest tide on record in Lewes.

Subsequent tidal flooding may again be moderate to major in many spots tonight and perhaps again on Sunday morning before the storm weakens and exits.

You can view tide tables for the various monitoring sites up and down the coast.

Delaware and New Jersey

New York and Connecticut

Rhode Island and Massachusetts

Rainfall

The dispersion of rain has been very convective today across southern New England and areas to the south. Radar currently shows some thunderstorms near Storrs, CT as well as just south of Newport, RI. In general, this has been a bit more sporadic in terms of rain than I think we had expected. Most nor’easters have more of a steady rain shield. I think we’re seeing a combination of the time of year and the very, very loose warm core nature of this storm. Not a hybrid tropical/extratropical storm per se, but it’s taking on some of those convective characteristics.

Radar loop ending around 12:50 PM ET Saturday. (WeatherFront)

Thus far, we have seen about 1 to 2 inches of rain on the Jersey Shore north of Atlantic City and on Long Island. Inland from there, it has been a bit less, with a half-inch to 1.5 inches or so from the Trenton area through New London and southern Rhode Island. How much more rain should we expect? Well, rain should pick up in intensity over a broader area tonight as the storm lifts north and west, pushing heavier rain into southeast Massachusetts and Rhode Island and probably Long Island and New Jersey again.

Additional rainfall expected through Monday. (WeatherFront)

Note the 5 inch total near Boston. There has been a rather consistent model signal for excessive rainfall between Boston and Providence and in southeast Massachusetts tonight and tomorrow since earlier this week. So I continue to say that area may be at highest risk for legitimate flash flooding, especially with high tides at the coast. Odds of 5 inches of rain in 24 hours at some point between now and Monday are 30 to 50 percent in various modeling. Those are some beefy odds, so again, watch the flooding risk in those areas. A Flood Watch is posted for the region.

(NWS Boston)

Overall, the themes of this storm are mostly what we expected, a mostly coastal flooding driven event. Power outages have not been awful, with currently only about 100,000 to 120,000 customers without power as of 1 PM today.

Power outages as of 1 PM ET Saturday (poweroutage.us)

We’ll see how tonight goes.

Around the horn

Let’s check out the rest of the newsy bits in the tropics.

Atlantic Basin

Tropical Storm Fay is back down to depression status, but it’s expected to linger like a Cranberries song for a few more days. Meanwhile, Gonzalo is…I don’t even know how to describe Gonzalo other than it’s a metaphor for this hurricane season. I guess it’s still a tropical storm, but all of its thunderstorms are displaced east of the center, and not just east, like 150 miles east.

The 2026 Atlantic hurricane season in a nutshell. (WeatherFront)

Both of these systems will be kaput before long.

Over the next 2 weeks, the odds of another fishy system are probably a little elevated, and we continue to see generic noise in the Gulf of Mexico that we can’t particularly get specific on right now. But we’ll keep tabs on things for the next couple weeks and see where this goes, if anywhere.

Polo pains

Hurricane Polo has weakened since yesterday, sort of. It’s now a high-end category 4 storm, but it’s beginning to wear down a little. That said, it’s still expected to maintain category 1 or 2 intensity as it hooks north into Baja by Monday night.

Hurricane Polo is expected to move toward Baja. Hurricane Odalys is to the west. (WeatherFront)

Polo’s biggest threat may be its rainfall however. We still continue to expect significant rain in the Desert Southwest, as well as Texas and the Plains. This will likely lead to increased flooding risk, especially in New Mexico (which has been hit very hard lately) and north and east from there next week. More to come on this.

National Blend of Models rainfall forecast through next weekend. (WeatherFront)

Hawaii

Hurricane Nolo continues to drench portions of Hawaii, especially the Big Island, where as much as 15 inches or more has fallen already in some spots and another 10 inches or more could still fall.

(NOAA/NHC)

Nolo should have minimal impacts as it stands right now on the western Hawaiian Islands.

East Coast storm gets underway as details come into better focus

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In brief: A significant nor’easter will impact New Jersey, Long Island, New York City, and New England this weekend with the threats becoming clearer today. We breakdown the specifics below. Plus, we have the latest on our newest Atlantic storm, Hurricane Polo back to cat 5 intensity, and Hurricane Nolo’s impacts in Hawaii.

Let’s start with the coastal storm we’ve been discussing all week. We’ll get the high notes out of the way first.

What has changed? A storm track slightly farther south but also farther west, bringing the center closer to the Jersey Shore and perhaps western Long Island, increasing potential wind risks and tidal flooding risks there.

What do these changes mean? Slightly higher risk of scattered power outages on the Jersey Shore or Long Island, as well as slightly higher high tide cycles.

On satellite, things are beginning to get going here, though the whole thing is still somewhat ill-defined.

Satellite image off the East Coast this afternoon. (WeatherFront)

A shield of rain sits off the Jersey Shore and extends up through Nantucket and Martha’s Vineyard.

Over the next 24 to 30 hours, this low pressure system will congeal and lift north, parking about 100 miles south of Long Island before making a left turn toward New Jersey. The storm may come ashore in Jersey, somewhere in Ocean County probably or just north of Atlantic City on Sunday. From there, the storm will weaken and eventually pull back east and northeast out to sea on Monday.

Google Deep Mind WeatherNext 3 ensemble forecast showing the left hook toward NJ and then a loop out to sea. I have drawn a rough “mean” track on here. (Weathernerds.org)

We are beginning to see some decent model agreement on this now across the board. Both higher resolution and more global resolution modeling is pretty much on board with this outcome.

So from a “what’s it mean” perspective, here’s a look.

Winds

For the most part, coastal areas between Long Beach Island, NJ and Nantucket will see 40 to 60 mph wind gusts. There is the possibility that some stronger gusts could impact Block Island, RI, Montauk and eastern Long Island, as well as Monmouth and Ocean Counties in New Jersey. If that happens, it would probably be either Saturday morning or sometime on Sunday morning. But the overall peak of wind with this storm will probably occur tomorrow morning.

Wind gusts will be 40 to 60 mph on the coast and 30 to 50 mph inland. (Pivotal Weather)

These types of wind gusts are pretty typical in stronger wintertime nor’easters. It just happens to be September 25th. Still, scattered power outages seem to be a safe bet, so if you live in an hour that tends to lose power with a nor’easter charge your phone this evening. That’s probably good advice for most people anyway, just in case, for whatever reason, the wind ends up overperforming.

Tidal flooding

The National Weather Service has good briefing slides worth checking out.

You can also view tide tables for the various monitoring sites up and down the coast.

Delaware and New Jersey

New York and Connecticut

Rhode Island and Massachusetts

In general, this looks to be a minor to moderate coastal flooding event, except perhaps in Nassau County, Staten Island, and the LI Sound side of New York City, where tidal flooding could be locally classified as “major.”

Rainfall

Total rainfall is expected to be 1 to 3 inches over about 36 to 48 hours. Again, for folks in Connecticut as an example, this is a different style of flooding risk than we saw a couple times this summer. This is more puddling than flooding.

Forecast rainfall this weekend. (Pivotal Weather)

However, I would keep an eye on a couple places for potentially more significant rainfall and potential for localized flash flooding.

1.) Jersey Shore: Some areas could see as much as 4 to 5 inches of rain depending on how close the center of the coastal low gets to the coastline.

2.) Eastern Long Island: Locally 5 inches or so of rain may fall, depending on exactly how close the low gets to the coastline.

3.) Southeast Massachusetts: This area may still have the highest risk of more excessive rainfall, as models have been consistently placing 4 to 6 inches or more in this general area. Odds of 5″+ over 24 hours are 30-40 percent near Cape Cod Bay. While this probably wouldn’t cause severe flash flooding, it could cause localized issues.

Probability of 5 inches or more of rain Saturday through Sunday morning. (WeatherFront)

Outside of those areas and the immediate coast dealing with tidal flooding, this storm will be a big old nuisance above anything else.

More later if anything changes or tomorrow.

Around the horn

Enter: Gonzalo

The 7th named storm of the Atlantic hurricane season formed today, as Tropical Storm Gonzalo developed from thunderstorms around the Cabo Verde Islands.

Gonzalo will not be long for this world. (WeatherFront)

Gonzalo should peak in intensity soon before diminishing as it lifts north away from the warmest water. Maximum sustained winds are around 50 mph. Elsewhere, Tropical Storm Fay is officially the biggest ACE contributor of the season, bringing our accumulated cyclone energy to 7.2 on the season (Fay accounts for 46 percent of that). Seasonal activity is now running at 8.3 percent of normal in terms of ACE. Remarkably low. Thank you, El Niño.

Polo is a monster

Maximum sustained winds reached 180 mph in Polo this morning, and this is validated from hurricane hunter aircraft in the storm, which probably arrived just past peak and recorded about 911 mb and 175 mph winds.

Hurricane Polo as a monster category 5 storm. (Tropical Tidbits)

Whatever the case, Polo will move into Baja this weekend as a weakening (but formidable) hurricane. Its moisture will get funneled into the Southwest, Texas, and Plains, and that will lead to flooding risk in the Desert Southwest, especially New Mexico and eastern Arizona on Monday and into the Plains on Tuesday as the remnants interact with a front.

Total estimated forecast rainfall through next Thursday across the Southern Plains and Southwest. (WeatherFront)

1 to 3 inches with higher amounts seems to be likely over a very broad area of the Plains and Southwest as this happens. More details on the flooding risk will become apparent as we get closer.

Hawaii still expecting terrible rain

A Hurricane Watch and Tropical Storm Warning are in effect for the Big Island of Hawaii as Hurricane Nolo tracks around the islands. Torrential rains on the order of an additional 20 to 25 inches remain possible in the mountains of the Big Island.

Nolo is expected to track far enough west of the westernmost Hawaiian islands right now to avoid serious impacts, but it’s worth keeping an eye on.