Southern California got slammed on Friday and early Saturday from one intense storm and yet another is now pounding away at northern California. A widespread 3-6 inch rainfall is expected in the San Francisco Bay and Sacramento Valley regions by early tomorrow from this latest in a series of storm systems. Even higher amounts of rain are possible in the higher elevations of the Santa Cruz Mountains over the next 24 hours or so. To go along with the heavy rain, there will be strong winds today and heavy mountain snows. As this seemingly daily onslaught continues in California, some amazing numbers are piling up with respect to rain and snowfall amounts.
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The past six weeks have seen the demise of weak La Nina conditions in the tropical Pacific Ocean and now there are signs of an unfolding El Nino. Ocean temperatures have increased to more than 2.0°C above normal just off the coast of Peru and this could very well develop into a more widespread event. Numerous computer forecast models now indicate a growing likelihood for an El Nino event in the equatorial Pacific – some as early as the spring in the Northern Hemisphere. If El Nino does form, it could have serious implications on global weather patterns and the 2017 Atlantic Basin tropical season.
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The news does not get any better for California. A monster storm will impact the state from late tonight into early Saturday and southern California will take the biggest hit from this system. In fact, this could turn out to be one of the worst storms in years for the southern part of the state with not just the heavy rain, but also wind and possible power outages. In addition, intense rainfall, especially over areas with steep terrain or with recent burn scars, may lead to rapid runoff; resulting in flash flooding and/or mudslides/debris flows. By early next week, yet another Pacific Ocean storm will head towards the state and this one is likely to concentrate its wrath on the northern part of California raising new concerns for the Oroville Dam.
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Historically weak solar cycle 24 continues to transition away from its solar maximum phase and towards the next solar minimum. There have already been 11 spotless days during 2017 and this follows 32 spotless days that occurred during the latter part of 2016. The blank look to the sun will increase in frequency over the next couple of years leading up to the next solar minimum - probably to be reached in late 2019 or 2020. By one measure, the current solar cycle is the third weakest since record keeping began in 1755 and it continues a weakening trend since solar cycle 21 peaked in 1980. One of the impacts of low solar activity is the increase of cosmic rays that can penetrate into the Earth’s upper atmosphere and this has some important consequences.
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There have been many occasions in the past in which floods have followed droughts in California and this recent time period is yet another example. In California, incredible amounts of rain have piled up in recent weeks across low-lying areas of the state, mountains of snow have accumulated in the higher elevations of the Sierra Nevada Mountains - and more is on the way. After a couple days with a break in the action, another storm is likely to arrive in northern California by later Wednesday and continue into early Thursday. After that, a second and very intense storm looks like it will slam the entire state by the end of the work week with southern California likely being especially hard hit with not just heavy rain, but also high wind, possible power outages and flash flooding.
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Our “January thaw” period is about to come to an end in the Mid-Atlantic region. A colder weather pattern will unfold over the next few days – set off by a significant stratospheric warming event near the North Pole - and it will result in rather sustained cold for the region. In fact, numerous recent years (2007, 2010, 2013, 2015) that featured major stratospheric warming events during the latter part of January all generally featured significantly colder-than-normal months of February in the eastern US.
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While the weather around here so far this winter has not been too newsworthy in terms of precipitation and temperatures, what has been going on in California and Europe has been quite amazing. There has been talk in recent years that this latest drought in California was going to be different this time and more of a “permanent” drought and there was also some talk that European winters would soon be lacking in snow – to say that both of these ideas are being seriously challenged this winter is quite an understatement. In California, incredible amounts of rain have piled up in recent days across low-lying areas of the state, mountains of snow have accumulated in the higher elevations of the Sierra Nevada Mountains - and much more is on the way. Meanwhile, Europe has experienced severe cold and substantial snow in recent weeks - and much more is about to punish that continent.
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Extremely cold weather has not only gripped much of the US during the past couple of days, but severe cold has hit Europe as well with widespread consequences including power and water outages, cut off villages, frozen rivers and lakes, and, unfortunately, numerous deaths.
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The drought in California has lessened in severity this year and significant rainfall over the next couple of days should continue to improve overall conditions. A major storm will bring another round of drought-denting rain to much of the western US over the next few days and this will add to recent rainfall that has helped to ease drought conditions across much of California. In fact, flash flooding is a near term threat in California from this storm and there is a risk of mudslides in areas that experienced wildfires earlier this year. Drenching rain from this upcoming storm will first arrive in southern Oregon and northern California late Friday and then it’ll push southward into southern sections of the state including LA and San Diego by early Saturday morning.
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VENCORE WEATHER FEATURED ON WTKI RADIO; Paul Dorian, Vencore meteorologist, was interviewed on WTKI Radio in Huntsville, AL. Listen to the interview here.
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