Today's forecast (again!): afternoon heat, nighttime rain

The Tampa Bay area's rain pattern of the past few days will remain in place, at least through Friday, meaning it will be sunny in the morning, hot in the afternoon until it starts raining and then rain through the night before starting over the next day.

The National Weather Service says rains should crank up in the afternoon, with the main focus of the storms away from the coast. Later, the storms will spread out, and people closer to the Gulf stand a chance of seeing rain.

The only difference is that today there's more a chance for hail because temperatures are cooler higher in the atmosphere.

Half-inch hail was reported to the weather service Tuesday near State Road 52 in Pasco during the early afternoon, when a severe thunderstorm lumbered over the area.

One person reported hail 0.7 of an inch in diameter near S.R. 52, just east of the Suncoast Parkway, the weather service said.

Also, quarter-inch hail was reported in Wimauma about 2 p.m. Tuesday.

Again, the biggest threat today will be lightning and heavy rain, with the possibility of hail thrown in.

Forecasters are still leaning toward a break in the rain by Friday, with it getting a bit drier by the weekend.

Some dry air is expected to move over the state by the weekend that will keep many storms from forming. Rain chances in the afternoons will drop to about 10 percent by the end of the weekend.

But it looks like rain chances start to crank back up by Tuesday.

One of the main impacts from the drier weather should be higher temperatures in the afternoons that forecasters say will climb into the 90s except right at the coast.

The monthly rainfall tally at Tampa International Airport was 8.07 inches as of Tuesday, or about 5.87 inches above normal for this point in May.

Lakeland is showing 13.36 inches, and St. Petersburg has 6.68 inches. The Lakeland total is at least 10 inches more than what normally falls in May.