Weekly Climate Summary: 02/06/2022

This week in Texas weather saw typical dry conditions in the west, but a series of storm systems in the east led to higher accumulations, especially in the Brazos Valley and along the Gulf Coast. The Panhandle, Big Bend Country, Hill Country, and South Texas Plains were the driest regions in the state across this period. While a few counties in these regions observed accumulations of 1-2”, such as Gray, Scurry, Ector, Sutton, and Kimble counties, the rest of these regions observed less than 1” of precipitation. The remainder of the state in the east observed higher rainfall totals. The Piney Woods Region and Northern Gulf Coast observed between 1-3” of precipitation across the period. Central Texas, specifically near the Brazos Valley and the Central Gulf Coast was the wettest region of the state. Rainfall accumulations averaged between 1-5” across most counties in the region. Travis County in particular was extremely wet observing 6-7” of precipitation, however, the wettest county in the state was Matagorda County observing 7-8” of precipitation.

While less extreme than the February Freeze of 2021, a similar cold-weather phenomenon occurred this week bringing cold temperatures and negative departures across the state. North Texas, the Piney Woods Region, the Gulf Coast, and the South Texas Plains observed temperatures 4-8 °F cooler than normal. Central Texas saw even cooler departures with temperatures 8-12 °F cooler than normal. Similar to Central Texas, the regions in the west also experienced more extreme departures. The Panhandle and Big Bend Country experienced temperatures 8-16 °F cooler than normal. Specifically, the wettest counties in the state were Henderson, Burnet, Brewster, Presidio, Jeff Davis, Pecos, Culberson, Wrinkler, Ector, Ward, Crane, Midland, Bailey, Hale, Lubbock, Potter, Randall, Oldham, Moore, Dallam, and Harley counties. All these counties recorded temperatures 12-16 °F cooler than normal.