Slightly below normal temperatures today with clearing skies. Warmer and drier weather late this week into the weekend with weak to moderate Santa Anas winds and highs 5-15 degrees above normal through Sunday. Temperatures begin to cool Monday as flow switches to onshore and troughing returns.
For extreme southwestern California including Orange, San Diego, western Riverside and southwestern San Bernardino counties,
Showers have come to an end this morning with skies quickly clearing. Mid-level water vapor satellite imagery shows the low that passed through California this morning is already over Nevada, with drier air filtering in on the back side of the low. Zonal flow today transitions to weak ridging by Thursday, allowing for one final morning of marine layer clouds along the coastline Thursday morning. Still, drier air will begin to mix in as offshore flow returns, and any clouds on Thursday will likely clear quickly after sunrise. Temperatures warm tomorrow by around 5 degrees over today for areas west of the mountains, staying steady for eastern areas as the weak ridge sets up. By Friday, offshore flow intensifies with a more robust high as global models hone in on a weak to moderate Santa Ana event for Friday through Sunday. With these northeasterly winds, warmer temperatures and drier conditions are in store of the weekend and highs for areas west of the mountains soar to the mid to upper 80s. Minor HeatRisk returns for the western regions as early as Friday, with localized areas of moderate HeatRisk for Saturday and Sunday. Humidity will fall to the teens this weekend for valleys and coastal mountains, with poor overnight recovery 35-50%.
Temperatures remain abnormally warm on Monday with high pressure over the region, despite a decrease in the offshore flow. Things cooldown a bit by Tuesday as the high shifts eastward and onshore flow resumes. The pattern mid to late next week remains chaotic, with both the GFS and ECMWF indicating a return to cooler weather and precipitation, but with very different outcomes. At this point confidence is high for a pattern shift, but as to what that will mean for SoCal remains to be seen.
041800, Low clouds based 2500-4000 ft MSL over San Diego County will scatter out in the next few hours. Otherwise, VFR conditions through Thursday morning, but with high clouds above 15 kft increasing after 01Z Thu.
No hazardous marine conditions are expected through next Monday morning.
Tides will increase at the end of the week, reaching 7 ft as early as Thursday in Orange County and Friday in San Diego County. Tides will peak on Sunday/Monday at 7.4-7.6 ft. A northwest swell (from ~300 degrees) of 2-3 ft with a 14-16 second period is predicted to arrive on Friday, likely to persist into next week. If this swell materializes per the current forecast, max surf of 6-7 feet would occur. Between the high tides near 7-7.5 feet and the elevated surf, minor to moderate coastal flooding is expected during high tides Saturday-Tuesday, especially for more west-facing coastlines.
Reminder, tides mentioned have been corrected to reflect the current trends in actual tide observations.
Ca, None. PZ, None.
