Hurricane Ian is already a Category 2 hurricane and is expected to reach major storm status before reaching the Gulf coast of Florida Wednesday or Thursday. It is forecast to be a very dangerous storm that, if it does make a direct hit on the Tampa area, could cause serious damage with a huge storm surge, torrential rains and catastrophic winds.

It is going to be a rough couple of weeks for portions of Florida.

Meanwhile in Texas, we are ready to say farewell to a rather uneventful hurricane season. Ian is only storm No. 4 in a season that is two weeks beyond its statistical peak and Texas has seen barely a threat the entire year. At this point, even with over two months of the season remaining, it seems unlikely the season will produce the kind of numbers initially projected by forecasters.

That made for a very peaceful tropical season for us in Houston. But, why are we calling for the end when hurricane season lasts until November 30?

By this point in the month of September, we have typically had our first decent cold front. In fact, that passed us Monday night and will bring much drier air along with temperatures into the low 60s or even 50s for spots well inland this week. These fronts have a tendency to act as blocks for hurricanes and are illustrative of a bigger climatological change that happens to us this time of year: namely fall (or whatever we call it here in Texas).

In fact, high pressure building over our area combined with high pressure over the Atlantic is what has helped to steer Ian more northerly from the Caribbean and towards Florida. And Texas has not seen a significant tropical weather threat after the last week of September in its history.

So, while we usher in fall-ish weather, we should also be able to thankfully bid adieu to hurricane season until next summer.