One of the better things about the onset of fall is the threat of a hurricane greatly diminishes.
To be fair, more than two months remain before the official end of hurricane season on Nov. 30, and the seas remain plenty warm for low pressure systems to spin into tropical storms.
But for Texas the threat of a meaningful collision with the tropics is rapidly diminishing. Since the 1850s, only three hurricanes have made landfall in the Lone Star State after today’s date, although this is the fourth anniversary of Hurricane Rita’s landfall east of Sabine Pass.
And as high wind shear continues to dominate the Gulf of Mexico and inhibit the formation of tropical storms as it has all season, ImpactWeather’s lead hurricane meteorologist, Chris Hebert, doesn’t see that changing.
“Given the current pattern across the U.S. and the climatological record, it appears unlikely that the Texas coast will see any hurricane activity for the remainder of the 2009 season,” he said. “Houston is probably in the clear.”
It’s been an especially quiet season to begin with, so the trepidation level was lower than usual, but this is still nice. And though Rita will remain an object lesson in not relying too much on the calendar, I feel pretty good about our prospects for remaining unscathed, at least till next year.