Meteorologist Michael Crowley

Did you feel that gust of wind in South Austin at around 6 AM to 6:30 AM? That burst of strong winds after the rain cleared was caused by a wake low, producing a powerful wind gust of 60 miles per hour at Austin Bergstrom International Airport, long after the rain had stopped.

NERD ALERT: A wake low is a pretty rare phenomenon that occurs when a large area of rain and thunderstorms produces a cool, dense, moist air mass at the surface. Since this makes the air more dense, it will result in a higher pressure than the air outside the storm. In response to this, an area of "lower" pressure forms behind the rain cooled thunderstorm, ad blows from high pressure to low pressure, oftentimes the opposite direction of the actual storm's movement. This type of meteorological phenomenon can produce significant wind gusts, and is particularly strange because it usually occurs after the storms have already passed and clouds are beginning to clear.

Overnight rainfall continues to clear this morning after a particularly rowdy night with strong winds and a very impressive lightning display across the area. Perfect weather to fall asleep to after the main line of storms rolled through! As we're waking up this Wednesday morning, it may be a bit breezy in the wake of the heavy downpours last night. A "wake" low is to thank for that. This produced a 60 mph wind gust at Austin-Bergstrom after the rain had already stopped. The winds have since weakened, but it is still a bit gusty behind the rain showers this morning.

There's a non-zero chance that we see some more activity this afternoon in the form of very isolated showers and even a few storms, but I anticipate a quiet and mostly cloudy day ahead. Later tonight, a line of strong to severe thunderstorms will develop to our west, but it will not maintain its strength and will weaken substantially as it approaches.

In the coming days, a stream of disturbances will keep us very busy with rain and thunderstorms nearly every day of our forecast. Given the prolonged rainy pattern that we have been in and will continue to see, flash flooding is an ever growing concern with our soils becoming more and more moist. By next week, Austin could receive nearly 3 inches of rainfall, with some localized spots elsewhere receiving more than 5 inches. Get the rain gear ready, you will need it.

This evening’s severe threat will be shifting east into the I-35 corridor in the next few hours, and a Severe Thunderstorm Watch has been issued until 1 AM Wednesday morning. This will include the chance for damaging winds as high as 70 miles per hour and very large hail. Already seeing lots of action on radar this evening. I expect this to continue into the nighttime hours.

Severe thunderstorms are possible this evening in Central Texas. We’re in a very humid and warm air mass, which can support isolated thunderstorms. We’ve already seen a few storms pop up in Lee County, and we expect more to form. This current Severe Thunderstorm Watch will be in effect until 11 PM this evening for Mason, Llano, and Gillespie counties.

There is the chance that another watch will be needed for areas farther west, but that will be decided at a later time. Until then, areas in the watch should be on the lookout for strong to severe thunderstorms, capable of damaging winds and very large hail.

For more details, cbsaustin.com/weather will have you covered.

We've talked enough about the hail and damaging winds. Let's talk about the rainfall we got from this squall line. Honestly, this was a great rain maker. Some locations picked up well over 2 inches and very very few saw no rainfall at all. We never saw any really significant flooding or scary amounts of rain coming down, which is really great news. This will do great things for our drought and our streams and rivers, and both Lake Buchanan and Lake Travis received a tiny bump in levels after tonight's heavy rainfall. We will continue to see more water flow into the lakes over the next few days.

Gotta say. This forecast model, the HRRR, absolutely nailed this forecast.

The latest model guidance is starting to show a bit more action ahead of the front than the previous runs had. This could mean more trouble for Central Texas. This front is expected to be a quick-mover. Thunderstorms ramp up tonight with severe weather and then we're winding down not long after the clock strikes midnight, so I was expecting a flooding threat. However, this is something I noticed yesterday as well. If we get quite a lot of pre-frontal thunderstorms like this model is forecasting we could see some much higher accumulations.

We're still on track for tonight's thunderstorms and I'm watching the latest model guidance closely this evening and will bring you more updates and forecasts when I get new info.

Well, things are finally starting to wind down for tonight. Austin has been trimmed from the Severe Thunderstorm Watch and now all we have are the occasional rolling thunder to fall asleep to and beautiful flashes of lightning crawling across the sky for miles. But almost 16,000 people are spending their night in the dark due to strong straight line winds.

Austin Bergstrom: 64 mph
Georgetown: 64 mph
Fredericksburg: 45 mph
Pflugerville: 39 mph
Austin Camp Mabry: 38 mph

We're getting a lot of rain in a short period of time tonight in Lee county, where 3-5 inches of rain have fallen in just 3 hours with additional rainfall possible over the next few hours. This Flash Flood Warning goes until 2:15 AM. Turn around, don't drown! Especially at night, there is not way for you to tell the difference between a shallow puddle and deep dangerous water. Just stay inside and be lazy.

Now THAT's a squall line! A 62 mile per hour wind gust at Austin Bergstrom tonight immediately followed by almost 2 inches of rainfall in just 1 hour!

We're calming down across the I-35 corridor, with just a few more significant storms left in Fayette county and Lee County. What a busy night!

8:53 PM - Zeroing in on Travis County/Austin for a moment.

There are currently FOUR different outflow boundaries (mini cold fronts of rain-cooled air) all converging over Travis County. Don't be surprised to see storms develop very quickly right overhead as these boundaries collide.

This could locally ramp up our heavy rain potential with a localized flood threat ahead of the main line moving in from the northwest. Severe weather (pockets of large hail/damaging wind gusts) still a concern.