Texas Climate Report: July 2010

Precipitation was abundant across most of the state, with most of the precipitation falling during the first half of July 2010. The month began with the remnants of Hurricane Alex, which made landfall in northern Mexico on June 30th and dropped several inches of rainfall across South Texas. During the first week of the month, moisture from the Gulf of Mexico streamed into the state and helped provide fuel for heavy rainfall across all of Texas, with the exception of the Trans Pecos. Rainfall totals during the first week of the month were particularly impressive across the Upper Coast, the Edwards Plateau, the Panhandle, and the Lower Valley, the latter of which was directly impacted by the landfall of Hurricane Alex. Brownsville picked up 6.14" of precipitation in a 24-hour period ending on the 1st. Four inches of rain fell in a 24-hour period ending on the 1st in Corpus Christi. During a 24-hour period from the 2nd-3rd, Houston Intercontinental picked up 5.45" of precipitation, a record for the month of July. As the remnants of Alex moved to the west, Lubbock picked up 4.38" of rainfall on the 2nd-3rd, also a record for July. A few days later, a frontal boundary stalled out across the Panhandle, dumping excessive amounts of precipitation (with an absence of severe weather reports). Amarillo broke its all-time 24-hour precipitation record as 7.25" of rain fell on the 7th-8th, and on the 8th, the maximum temperature was only 71°F. Amarillo also set a July record with a monthly precipitation total of 8.02".

Precipitation was spottier during the second half of the month, as moisture from the Gulf of Mexico sparked daily isolated to scattered storms. The remnants of Tropical Storm Bonnie moved to the west over the northern Gulf of Mexico the last week of the month and brought widespread wet weather over the eastern half of the state. On the 25th, 75 mph winds were reported at Alamo Heights in Bexar County, one of the few severe weather events reported during the entire month. For the month, both Houston (12.92" at Intercontinental, 18.54" at Houston Heights) and Port Arthur picked up more than a foot of rainfall, which was common for most areas in the Upper Texas coast. In the western part of the state, radar estimates indicated that between 10"-15" of rainfall fell between Lubbock and San Angelo during July. Monthly mean temperatures were close to normal across most of the state, with minimum temperatures above normal and maximum temperatures generally below normal. This is an indication that humidity levels were higher than typical July levels as the spread between daily highs and lows was smaller than normally observed. The average temperatures were slightly above normal the eastern half of Texas and below normal in the western half of the state. The warmest day of the month was the 31st, as high temperatures topped the century mark at several locations, including 105°F at San Angelo (tying a daily record), 103°F at Wichita Falls, 102°F at Dallas-Fort Worth, and 101°F at Waco.

This bulletin has been created on 06-01-2012 from historical climate data. No climate narrative is available.

Monthly Summary for Selected Cities

Monthly Extremes

New Monthly Records

Climatic Averages for August