Region placed under severe storm watch

AUSTIN (KXAN) - The Austin metro area and the Texas Hill Country was placed under a severe thunderstorm warning Monday afternoon and was expected to remain in effect until late night. Parts of Llano and Gillespie counties were under a tornado warning late in the afternoon.

The warning officially ended at 6 p.m., but conditions for severe storms in the area continued. The storms packing high winds were heading east and southeast early in the evening.

Flooding drenched Main street in Llano. Some utility poles were damaged on the south end of town. The city manager office was monitoring the situation in Llano, but no emergencies were reported.

The severe storms in Central Texas came in a cluster of strong to severe storms has developed east of San Angelo.

The storms are expected to develop into a large complex of strong to severe thunderstorms as they track east late this afternoon and evening.

Frequent, dangerous lightning is also expected.

This is probably just the beginning of what may be nearly a week of rainy weather.

A cold front will moving into Central Texas Monday evening caused the development of showers and thunderstorms. A Severe Thunderstorm Watch was posted for San Saba and Mason counties Monday afternoon, as storms fired near San Angelo. Strong to severe storms are expected to spread east toward the Austin metro area Monday evening.

As the front settles slowly south of the area Tuesday, additional rain and storms are forecast.

The rain chances won’t end there. An upper-level, low-pressure system has developed over southern California and will cut off from the main belt of westerly winds aloft, causing it to drift slowly toward Texas all week.

Because of the slow movement of the storm, a series of disturbances will move across Texas -- bringing clouds and a chance of rain every day.

Rainfall totals of 1- to 4 inches or more are expected across the KXAN News viewing area before the system exits the region Friday night.