Between a recent heat wave, gusty winds and an overnight rain storm, the Bay Area’s April weather has been nothing short of erratic.
Don’t expect that to change. Although Sunday is expected to be clear and warmer, meteorologists predict more wet weather starting Tuesday morning with another storm on track to hit later in the week.
Those April showers are a welcome sign for a region struggling with drought conditions and could produce some green in the browning hills of the Sacramento Valley, where just last week weather officials issued their earliest ever red-flag wildfire warning.
“Rainfall like this could help the dry grasses and fuel levels out there absorb some moisture and eliminate the possibility of a wildfire,” explained Matt Mehle, a meteorologist in the National Weather Service.
Rain is overspreading the Bay Area and Central Coast early this morning. Look for light to moderate showers to persist into the late morning hours before diminishing. Keep the umbrella handy if you’re heading out this morning! #cawx pic.twitter.com/DqYZsMVqrN
— NWS Bay Area 🌉 (@NWSBayArea) April 16, 2022
By Saturday morning, overnight rainfall in the Bay Area reached just 0.2 inches in the Santa Clara Valley, which was shielded from a much stronger downpour that dropped 1.5 inches in the Santa Cruz Mountains.
Meanwhile, the East Bay hills saw about half an inch of rain, compared to 0.25 inches in Oakland and inland areas of Alameda and Contra Costa counties.
Conditions should remain dry through the start of the work week, but likely not past Monday night.
“There’ll be a break in the action with some quiet weather, and then we’ll see another round of rainfall, followed by another break and then we’re back to it by late Wednesday night and early Thursday morning,” Mehle said.
Although the system arriving early in the week isn’t expected to bring a lot of rain, the storm that’s forecast to arrive mid-week could be much heavier, he added.
As for temperatures, South Bay residents can expect highs in the low-70s on Sunday with lows in the 50s. Oakland will see low-60s on Sunday with a little warming on Monday and overnight lows in the low-to-mid 40s, while inland cities such as Livermore could see the nighttime chill dip into the low-30s.
📡Radar Update 11:15 AM – Showers continue to diminish across the Bay Area and Central Coast. This trend will continue with dry conditions expected this afternoon. #cawx pic.twitter.com/FoQnYHWM8I
— NWS Bay Area 🌉 (@NWSBayArea) April 16, 2022
After a string of dry winter months, late March brought stormy weather that tripled quarterly rainfall totals in some parts of the Bay Area, aided further by bouts of light rain throughout April.
Still, meteorologists had hoped for more precipitation out of the spring after a promising start to the fall. The South Bay remains particularly parched compared to previous weather seasons.
“We really went from feast to famine right around the start of the new year for this water year alone,” said Drew Peterson, a National Weather Service meteorologist.
Before Saturday’s early morning storm, San Jose had seen 57% of the rainfall between Oct. 1 and now that it does in the same period in an average year, according to weather records.
But that’s an improvement from last year, when the city had seen just 43% of typical rainfall between Oct. 1 and April 15. And on the bright side, other parts of the Bay Area have seen far more rain this season than they did a year ago.
Oakland has recorded 93% of its typical rainfall since Oct. 1 and the San Francisco Airport area has seen 94% over the same stretch. On April 15 last year, the two weather stations respectively had recorded 44% and 39% of normal rainfall.
Time will tell whether April can be a “Miracle March” month that replenishes state reservoirs with heavy rains during drought years. But it looks unlikely.
“As we go forward, it’s much more rare to see rain systems that would really make a dent in the drought,” Peterson said. “We would need a strong atmospheric river to get back to something close to normal for this water year.”
Source: www.mercurynews.com