A strong late-season Pacific storm that brought damaging winds and more rain and snow to saturated California has been blamed for two deaths and forecasters said additional flooding was possible Wednesday in parts of the state.
Tuesday’s storm blasted the San Francisco Bay Area with powerful gusts and downpours, pounded Sacramento — the state capital — with intense hail and set rainfall records in Southern California.
Millions of Californians are under threat from an approaching storm that could trigger intense downpours and widespread flooding in many parts of the state, including in some mountainous areas already buried under a near-record snowfall.
After a weeks of unusually bad weather on the West Coast, another storm known as an atmospheric river could dump as much as 3 inches of rain in the San Francisco Bay area and across the Central Coast through the weekend, the National Weather Service said in its forecast.
Millions of Californians were under threat on Thursday from an approaching storm that could trigger intense downpours and widespread flooding in many parts of the state, including in some mountainous areas already buried under a near-record snowfall.
After a weeks of unusually bad weather on the West Coast, the storm known as an atmospheric river could dump as much as 3 inches (8 cm) of rain in the San Francisco Bay area and across the Central Coast from Thursday through the weekend, the National Weather Service (NWS) said in its forecast.
Californians used less water in June but are still falling short of the 15% mark set by Governor Gavin Newsom.
According to numbers released Tuesday by the State Water Resources Control Board, Californians cut water usage by 7.5% in June compared to June 2020. However, between July 2021 and the end of June 2022, water usage dipped by just 2.7%.
A favorite San Francisco Bay Area spot for sleeping under towering redwood trees is temporarily shutting down its campground again this summer because of California’s historic drought.
Portola Redwoods State Park said Tuesday that its campground facilities with 55 sites and four group sites will be closing Aug. 5 and not reopening for the remainder of the season because of low flows on its main water source, Peters Creek. (The campground closes every winter, from Nov. 1 to April 1.)
Extreme storms like the massive bomb cyclone that drenched the San Francisco Bay Area last October are likely to become more powerful in the coming decades as climate change alters atmospheric conditions.
The Bay Area could see between 26% and 37% more water from these mega-storms by the end of the century, according to a new study from the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory commissioned by the city.
An unusual winter heatwave is expected across California this week with record temperatures in the forecast for multiple cities from the San Francisco Bay Area to Los Angeles.
In Southern California, where temperatures are predicted to be 15 to 20 degrees above normal from Wednesday morning through Sunday, the National Weather Service upgraded a heat watch to a heat advisory.
The heat watch and advisory were the first to be issued by the Los Angeles weather office in the month of February, according to records dating to 2006. Most heat watches and warnings in the area are issued from May through October.
The start of the wet season was promising in California, with a record-breaking atmospheric river in October and an onslaught of storms in December, but the weather forecast has remained persistently dry since the start of the year — with no hope for rain in the immediate future.
The lack of rain during what is usually the wettest time of the year is problematic in a drought-plagued state that needs to replenish its water supply and dampen a wildfire-prone landscape. The last hope that remains for winter is a surge of precipitation in late February and in March. What are the chances of that even happening?
A weak atmospheric river rolled through the San Francisco Bay Area early Tuesday, dumping more than 2 inches of rain in the Marin County community Kentfield, nestled in the shadow of Mt. Tamalpais, but giving little relief to the drought stricken South Bay. Rainfall totals over the last 24 hours depended entirely on what zip code you lived in. The National Weather Service said as of 5 a.m., 2.21 inches had fallen in Kentfield, 1.57 inches in Santa Rosa and 1.66 inches in Mill Valley.
A moisture-rich atmospheric river is forecast to hit California on Sunday and Monday, delivering a much needed drenching of rain to a drought-plagued state at a time of year when big storms are unusual.
It’s unclear at this point where the bull’s-eye of the storm will dump the most rain, but forecasters agree it will likely be anywhere from far Northern California to Central California, with the San Francisco Bay Area being impacted. The wettest spots could see up to a foot of rain.
The Water News Network is San Diego County’s source for water news and information.
