Improving Atmospheric Forecasts with Machine Learning
An efficient, low-resolution machine learning model can usefully predict the global atmospheric state as much as three days out.
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Drought Makes Early Start of the Fire Season Likely in Northern California
/in California and the U.S., Home Headline, Media Coverage /by Mike Lee /Los Angeles Timesby Paul DuginskiExpanding and intensifying drought in Northern California portends an early start to the wildfire season, and the National Interagency Fire Center is predicting above-normal potential for large wildfires by midsummer.
Mountain snowpack has been below average across the High Sierra, southern Cascades and the Great Basin, and the agency warns that these areas need to be monitored closely as fuels continue to dry out. The agency also cites a warm, dry pattern in Oregon and central and eastern Washington, and assigns all of these areas a higher-than-average likelihood of wildfires in July.
Early April Precipitation is Expected to be Below Normal Where it is Most Needed in Northern California
/in Media Coverage, San Diego County /by Kimberlyn Velasquez /The Los Angeles Timesby Paul DuginskiApril showers may be more scarce than normal north of Point Conception in California, according to an outlook produced by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.
Early April Precipitation is Expected to be Below Normal Where it is Most Needed in Northern California
/in California and the U.S., Home Headline, Media Coverage /by Mike Lee /Los Angeles Timesby Paul DuginskiApril showers may be more scarce than normal north of Point Conception in California, according to an outlook produced by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.
This area where the probability of precipitation is below normal includes virtually all of Northern California and the crucial northern Sierra Nevada, where the state’s largest reservoirs are located.
While snow cover has increased thanks to a series of March storms, the Northern Sierra 8-Station Index stands at 56% of normal for the season. As of March 24, another 29.25 inches would be needed to reach the season normal of 54.52 inches.
Dry Conditions in California Continue to Expand, but Will March Rains Dent the Drought?
/in Media Coverage, San Diego County /by Mike Lee /Los Angeles Timesby Paul DuginskiThe most recent U.S. Drought Monitor data, released Thursday, show that about 48% of California is in moderate drought. That’s up from 34% a week ago.
An additional 30% of the state is abnormally dry, according to the data.
The data were compiled Tuesday, so the figures do not reflect moisture from Southern California’s most recent storm.
California May Need a ‘Miracle March’ to Prevent an Early and Dangerous Wildfire Season
/in California and the U.S., Home Headline, Media Coverage /by Kristiene Gong /AccuWeatherby John RoachA brush fire that grew to 175 acres in Norco, California, on Tuesday was perhaps a preview of what could be an early and dangerous wildfire season in a state that just had its driest February on record. It was the eighth fire incident in 2020, according to the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection (CAL FIRE). That already equals the number of fire incidents before April 1 in the last four years combined.
San Francisco Could See Its First Rainfall Since January as a Potentially Wetter California Weather Pattern Takes Shape
/in California and the U.S., Home Headline, Media Coverage /by Kristiene Gong /The Weather Channelby Linda LamMuch needed rain will finally return to California and will likely end a month-plus dry streak in San Francisco and Sacramento. Dry conditions have prevailed across most of California since late January due to the upper-level pattern. A strong area of high pressure aloft near California has pushed the jet stream and storm track northward into the Pacific Northwest.
The persistence of this pattern has resulted in drought conditions during the wet season. Nearly 70% of the Golden State is abnormally dry, and about a third of the state is in moderate drought, according to the latest report from the U.S. Drought Monitor.
California Abnormally Dry After Low Precipitation Winter
/in California and the U.S., Media Coverage /by Mike Lee /The Associated Pressby Olga R. RodriguezA winter with little precipitation has left most of California abnormally dry and officials are bracing for the possibility of an early and more intense wildfire season amid record-breaking temperatures.
Drought has expanded to nearly a quarter of the state, mainly in central California, the heart of the state’s agricultural sector, according to a U.S. Drought Monitor map mad public Thursday. The map shows 70 percent of the state is abnormally dry.
2020 Snow Report
/in California and the U.S., Home Headline, Media Coverage /by Mike Lee /Climate CentralA new Climate Central report analyzes snowfall trends over the past fifty years, finding that snowfall has been decreasing in the spring and fall seasons across much of the U.S. but with clear regional differences.
The impact of climate change on snow can be a tricky story to tell. While warming winters would suggest that more precipitation will fall as rain instead of snow, a warming climate is also associated with increased precipitation which, in cold regions, can lead to an increase in snowfall. A new report from Climate Central aims to make sense of this challenging subject—analyzing snowfall data collected between 1970 and 2019 from 145 stations across the country.
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