Forecasters predicting dry conditions with no rain in sight
Red flag alerts issued in Bay Area scheduled to run through today
A n abnormal weather pattern sweeping through the Bay Area through today is raising wildfire concerns at the start of the December, possibly extending an already exhausting fire season.
The National Weather Service issued a red flag warning for much of the Bay Area lasting from Sunday night through 11 a.m. today, as gusty offshore winds were expected to suck more moisture out of the already- desiccated hillsides.
The weather was another grim reminder of the unusually dry weather Northern California has been experiencing all year.
The entire North Bay, the East Bay Hills and Interior Valley, the Santa Cruz Mountains and San Francisco Peninsula Coast were all under the warning as forecasters predicted winds of 15 to 25 miles per hour and gusts of up to 45 mph above 1,000 feet.
The high winds were to dry over the landscape overnight, sending moisture levels tumbling as poor overnight recovery is predicted, lowering humidity to 20 to 30% by today.
And the unusual weather isn’t over yet. National Weather Service meteorologist Gerry Diaz said Sunday that when the offshore winds die down this morning, a general warming trend will send temperatures above normal in the Bay Area for the week.
There’s also no significant chance of rain for the foreseeable future, Diaz added, with dry skies possibly lasting through the end of the month or even into January.
“The concern right now is when we will have that moisture come in so we have enough to get some rain in the area,” Diaz said. “Unfortunately, right now at least through the middle of December and even the second half of the month, we’re not seeing a huge chance for it.”
T he Bay Area already is under ex treme drought conditions, Diaz said, so without much rain through the end of the month fire danger during the next season is likely to be much higher.
The Bay Area could enter the dry season already parched thanks in part to La Niña, an ocean- atmosphere phenomenon that dries and warms Northern California.
PG& E issued notice of public- safety power shutoffs, but by Sunday afternoon, the utility said that only about 8,500 customers would be affected by shutdowns starting early Monday in Fresno, Madera, Mariposa, Tulare and Tuolomne counties.
Diaz said seeing red flag warnings this time of year is quite rare, with the last two occurring in the similarly dry winters of 2013 and 2017.
“La Niña lasts for months, so some time in around March or April is when those weather patterns will start to mitigate,” he said. “That means this could be a winterlong situation. We would essentially go into the dry season with very dry conditions, similar to what we had in the early part of the 2010s when we had a bit of a drought.”