A First Alert Weather Day has been declared for Thursday due to heavy thunderstorms in the Piney Woods

DEEP EAST TEXAS (KTRE) - Skies will clear out tonight, setting the stage for another chilly night as lows drop into the lower 40′s.

Wednesday will be our best weather day of the week as we get a return to near full sunshine and southerly breezes. The south winds will lead to a milder day with highs climbing to near 70-degrees.

We then turn our focus to a developing storm system that will bring in increasing rain and thunderstorm chances to the Piney Woods on Thursday.

With strong-to-severe thunderstorms possible, we have a First Alert Weather Day in place for Thursday for all of deep east Texas.

We will likely have two waves or rounds of thunderstorms that will impact our region. The first wave will be in the mid-afternoon hours as scattered thunderstorms develop and push through the Piney Woods. Not everyone will get on this round, but the storms that do form will be strong and will contain locally heavy downpours. A second and widespread round of heavy thunderstorms will then arrive late Thursday night, around the midnight hour, in association with a strong cold front for the middle of March.

With a low-end threat for severe weather on Thursday afternoon and Thursday night, large hail and damaging winds are the main threats at this time.

Some of the rain may be locally heavy at times and there is a low-end risk for severe weather, too. That is time period you will want to stay weather alert.

Rainfall amounts look to average around one-to-two inches, with isolated, higher amounts possible given the ample moisture this cold front will have to work with.

The cold front blowing into the Piney Woods for St. Patrick’s Day this Friday will have some cold air associated with it. There will be some lingering clouds and a few showers in the morning before the rain chances dwindle by Friday afternoon. The bigger story, though, will be the blustery north winds and chilly temperatures invading the state to close out the week. Highs will be in the lower 50′s on St. Patrick’s Day under those cloudy skies and brisk northerly winds.

This will set the stage for an unseasonably chilly weekend in which we will have wake-up temperatures in the middle 30′s with highs only reaching the middle 50′s. These cold mornings may also come with some patchy frost.

If you have done some spring planting, you may want to protect the tender vegetation that may be sensitive to the cold since some patchy frost may be possible this weekend in the late night, early morning hours.

After a dry weekend under mostly cloudy skies, another disturbance looks to bring back some modest rain chances early next week as the chilly weather looks to stick around for several days to come.

To stay on top of the weather conditions in your neighborhood, make sure you download and frequent our KTRE First Alert weather mobile application. It gives you access to our First Alert forecast, severe weather alerts, interactive radar, and featured video updates. It is weather on the go, when you want it, at your convenience, right in the palm of your hand.

Copyright 2023 KTRE. All rights reserved.