More heat likely as temperatures rise
Cooling arrives this weekend; rain by Sunday is a slight possibility
Bay Area residents can keep their jackets and sweaters in the closet for a couple more days in favor of sunscreen and shorts. Call it summer light. “We’ve had high pressure off the eastern part of the Pacific Ocean, and (Wednesday) that ridge is moving directly overhead,” National Weather Service meteorologist Brooke Bingaman said. Warm temperatures are forecast for today and Friday, but it won’t be as warm as Wednesday.
At 12:20 p.m. Wednesday, temperatures in the South Bay, Santa Cruz and Central Coast areas already had reached 80 degrees. In Concord, and other far inland areas, it was 75 degrees by 11:30 a.m., according to the weather service.
That warm air will blanket the region until Friday, she said.
The warm wave comes after the high-pressure ridge pushed out winds that were strong enough to bring a wind advisory late Monday night into Tuesday, according to Bingaman. There will be winds over the next couple of days, but Bingaman said they will be light and blowing in the direction of the ocean.
“That’s why we won’t feel that marine coolness,” she said.
The on-shore flow of winds — from ocean toward land — are expected to return Friday, when a low-pressure system building over the Pacific starts to affect the region and begins to push the high-pressure ridge farther east, Bingaman said.
That will cool down the temperatures and could set the stage for rain by Sunday.
“We have medium confidence” that the rain will arrive, Bingaman said. “The models show different things, but the most prominent scenario is that the low pressure in the Eastern Pacific will move into our region, and that could bring a little bit of rain.”
In in the interim, the weather is expected to be as pleasant as can be expected.