Winter weather arrives in Central Texas

AUSTIN (KXAN) - Old man winter has finally arrived in Central Texas and the National Weather service has issued a winter weather advisory for some of the area in his wake.

If you see weather in your area send it to the KXAN newsroom via our Report It page or by emailing it to reportit@kxan.com .

Areas in the Austin Metro were not affected by the weather event as much as the Hill Country which remains under a winter weather advisory until 6:00 pm. Resident’s in Dripping Springs are seeing a light dusting of sleet which as it lands on the warmer ground is melting.

For those living in the Fredericksburg Snow is falling and area roadways are getting a light dusting of the white stuff which is sticking around due to colder temperatures in the region.

“This morning an upper disturbance brought in some warmer moist air that overran our shallow cold air we had at the surface. Morning lows were generally in the mid 20s out in the Hill Country, and upper 20s along the I-35 corridor,” KXAN’s Dave Mazza said.

The moisture didn’t arrive in most parts of our area until after sunrise, and in fact a lot of us saw some sunshine this morning, which helped push temps into the upper 30s. “Because our air-mass close to the ground was pretty dry, we did have some evaporation occur with some of the initial moisture,” Mazza said. “Just like when you sweat when you are hot, and the process of evaporating that sweat off your skin cools you down, the evaporation in the air does the same thing. So temps in the Hill Country, mainly in Gillespie and Llano counties actually fell a few degrees after getting close to freezing this morning. This allowed for some sleet and snow to fall across the Hill Country this morning.”

Mazza says he expects to see some reports of sleet in the area along the IH-35 corridor but is not forecasting any considerable event in out area.

Residents in Gillespie county should see the colder temperatures stick around into the noon hour. Mazza says the good news; however, temperatures there have climbed into the mid to upper 30s.

“This means any light sleet and snow flurries that are falling, melt when they hit the warmer ground,” said Mazza.
Remember to exercise extra caution on the bridges and overpasses, and especially those taller ones. Those roadways tend to stay a bit colder because of the open air above and below them.

Sleet has been reported in a lot of spots in our area including: Gillespie County outside of Fredericksburg, in Fredericksburg, San Marcos, Wimberley, Western/Northern Hays County, Lockhart, Western Caldwell County.
We still have a Winter Weather Advisory in effect until 6pm for Mason, San Saba, Lampasas, Burnet, Blanco, Williamson, Travis, & Hays Counties.

There is a Winter Storm Warning in effect until 6pm for Gillespie and Llano counties mainly due to light sleet/snow and the continuing below freezing temps.