The last of three straight storm systems that rolled down the Alaskan Gulf as if it was a conveyor built dropped another healthy dose of rain on the Bay Area overnight Thursday and was set to to leave scattered showers as it migrates away from the region.
Now that all three have done the bulk of their respective work, does that mean the Bay Area is about to dry out?
“We get a day, maybe two for some areas,” National Weather Service meteorologist Rachel Kennedy said. “And it’s gonna be pretty damp and cold.”
Then it will be back to the rain. Kennedy said a fourth system — this one a bit different from the previous three but traveling a similar path from the north — is set to arrive in the North Bay sometime about midday Saturday and is likely to spread through the region on Sunday. Come Monday, Kennedy said the entire region should anticipate downfalls.
“The light and moderate rain begins for all of the Bay Area really on Sunday,” she said. “But it’s going to be much more widespread and heavier Monday into Tuesday.”
In the Sierra Nevada, a break to the onslaught of snow that led to a deadly avalanche that killed eight people and left one missing is expected. Heavy snow is expected to fall through Thursday afternoon and then it may do so again late Thursday night, according to the weather service. After that, the snow is expected to stop until Sunday.
The stormy weather that’s on deck will be created by certain elements that could turn the system into an atmospheric river, Kennedy said. As it descends from the north, the storm system will pull up moisture from a tropical system that’s off the coast of Southern California.
That rain will add to totals that have only grown bigger and bigger.
Since the rain began falling Sunday, areas above the 3,000-foot elevation mark in the Santa Lucia Range had received about 9 inches of rain, while lower elevations there have received from 5-7 inches through 7 a.m. Thursday, the weather service said. The latter amount also has fallen in the Santa Cruz Mountains.
In downtown San Francisco, about 3.15 inches of rain had fallen since Sunday. At the San Francisco Airport and areas of the Peninsula, the weather service measured 2½ inches of rain, the same total as in downtown Oakland. San Jose and Concord had received about 2¼ inches.
As for Thursday, the weather service said isolated showers that are light to moderate will continue for the entire day. Overnight, the bulk of the system soaked the region. The Santa Cruz Mountains and Santa Lucia Range received between 1 and 1½ inches of rain overnight, according to the weather service, while Contra Costa, Alameda and Santa Clara counties recorded totals between a half-inch and full inch of rain.
“The main band of that system has passed us,” Kennedy said. “So now it’s just isolated showers, and then we’ll get drier days Friday and for much of the region on Saturday.”
In between, the Bay Area is expected to suffer through an extremely cold day without rain on Friday. Temperatures in the warmest places aren’t expected to escape the low 50s and will remain in the high 40s in most places. The lows are expected to dip into the low 30s in most places and into the high 20s in areas of the North Bay and in the higher elevations elsewhere.
The coldest weather is expected near the central coast, where a winter weather advisory for the Santa Lucia and San Benito Mountains in Monterey County began at midnight Thursday and will last until 7 a.m. Friday.
Winds also are expected to gust up to 40 to 50 mph in the higher elevations until late Thursday morning, when they are expected to calm significantly.
“We might get the breezy afternoon winds like we normally do,” Kennedy said. “But those really high gusts are going to go away.”
The tropical moisture associated with the next storm also is expected to lift temperatures closer to their seasonal norms, with the highs in the warmest places getting back into the 60s, and the lows moving back into the upper 40s and 50s.