East Texas May Have to Wait Until November to Get Any Rainfall

We are a little past the halfway mark of October, and it has been around a month since the last significant rainfall in East Texas. Officially, no rain has been recorded for the month at the Angelina Airport.

Likewise, no rain has fallen at the official measuring stations for Tyler and Longview, Texas.

When Is The Next Chance of Rain for East Texas?

There's bad news and good news. The bad news is that most of the computer weather models I checked show no rainfall for east and northeast Texas for the remainder of October.

The good news is that these are medium to long-range forecast models. There could be some changes between now and the end of the month. For instance, several of the models recently showed a chance of showers over East Texas closer to Halloween, but that changed over the past 24 hours.  Perhaps, it could change again.

If East Texas doesn't receive any rain between now and November 1, that would mean that Lufkin, Tyler, and Longview would have gotten no rain for the entire month of October. I don't have access to the monthly weather archives, but at the very least, that means we will have tied a record for the driest October in history.

It's Getting Dangerously Dry

Most East Texas counties are under burn bans. The exceptions (as of October 18) are a few counties along the Interstate 20/Interstate 30 corridor, a couple of counties south of Houston, and one county in Deep East Texas (San Augustine).

Those campfires at the deer lease, outdoor fires at a Halloween get-together, or homecoming bonfires could be in jeopardy unless we get some significant showers.

Currently, the Texas Forest Service places most of East Texas in a moderate level of fire danger. A small area in northern Nacogdoches County falls in the high-danger category.