Nicholas is Officially a Hurricane as it Slams Texas Coastline

The National Hurricane Center has officially upgraded Nicholas to a full-fledged hurricane with maximum sustained winds of 75 mph.  Nicholas will not hold on to that hurricane status for long though as it is expected to weaken back to a tropical storm as it make landfall sometime around midnight tonight.  That landfall should take place just to the west of Freeport, Texas.

Hurricane Nicholas is currently moving towards the north-northeast at about 10 mph.  It's expected to make a more northeasterly turn on Tuesday.  That track will take the center of the storm to the south of Deep East Texas.

Periodic heavy rainfall over the Pineywoods is still a possibility over the next 36 hours, but due to the altered track of the storm system as well as the adjusted forecast of forward movement of the storm, most of East Texas should see rainfall amounts of an inch or two.  Higher amounts are possible south of Lufkin/Nacogdoches.  Tyler, Jasper and Newton Counties are under a flash flood watch through Wednesday. Four to six inches of rain could be commonplace in those counties.  Six to eighteen inches of rain are possible along the coastline of southeast Texas and southwest Louisiana.  As of this posting, two to four inches of rain have already fallen in areas from High Island to Matagorda Bay.

Winds gusting to 25-30 mph are possible across the Lufkin/Nacogdoches area on Tuesday, with possible tropical storm gusts (greater than 39 mph) in Polk, Tyler, Jasper and Newton Counties.

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