DFW likely to get much-needed rain this weekend

Holiday shoppers will need their umbrellas Sunday.

While temperatures are expected to be balmy, there’s a 60 percent chance of rain throughout the day and night Sunday, according to the National Weather Service in Fort Worth.

“There could be some thunderstorms but no severe weather,” meteorologist Tom Bradshaw said. “Everybody should get some rainfall on Sunday.”

And the rain is definitely needed.

The latest U.S. Drought Monitor shows that Parker and Tarrant counties are almost entirely in exceptional drought — the worst rating — while much of North Texas is in extreme drought.

At Dallas/Fort Worth Airport, the official recording station for the National Weather Service:

▪ Rainfall is 40.05 inches below normal from October 2010 through November 2014.

▪ Only one month this year — August — has had above-average rainfall.

▪ The rainfall total through November makes this the 12th-driest year on record in the past 116 years.

While rain is expected Sunday, Saturday should feel more like spring, with highs around 70.

A storm system will arrive from the West Coast on Sunday — the same one that hammered California with high winds and heavy rain — but forecasters say it won’t have the same intensity as it moves into North Texas.

Forecasters say North Texans could see up to 2 inches of rain before the front moves out by Monday.

This story was originally published December 12, 2014 at 9:59 AM with the headline "DFW likely to get much-needed rain this weekend."