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Big storms of Fire & Ice - The Weekend Forecast for the World

3,315 views · Published 8 December 2017 · 7:59 · Indexed 23 October 2026

Channel: thornews · 2017 · News & Politics

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https://www.wunderground.com/cat6/no-rain-sight-fire-plagued-southern-california

No Rain in Sight for Fire-Plagued Southern California

Three days of wildfire in and near Los Angeles have left at least one person dead, more than 100,000 acres scorched, more than 200,000 people under evacuation orders, and hundreds of structures lost. The fire-fueling Santa Ana winds weren’t quite as strong as feared on Thursday, but the parched atmosphere was enough to keep several massive fires almost completely uncontained. Relative humidities dropped below 10% on Thursday afternoon—and as low as 2% in parts of San Diego County—as temperatures approached 80°F at lower elevations. Mild, dry weather is expected to continue for at least the next week, with weaker but persistent offshore winds keeping the humidity low.

The Thomas Fire, which spanned some 96,000 acres and was just 5% contained as of 10 am PST Thursday, continued to gobble up new territory west and north of the city of Ventura. More than 15,000 homes were threatened by the blaze. The tiny coastal enclave of Faria Beach was hastily evacuated on Thursday afternoon as flames reached Highway 101, the main route connecting beach communities northwest of Los Angeles. A woman’s body was recovered from a car in a canyon north of Ventura, the first fatality with a possible link to this week’s fires.

By late Thursday, a new blaze—the Lilac Fire—had quickly consumed 2000 acres near the town of Bonsall, about 35 miles north of San Diego. Two injuries were reported and some 1000 homes were at risk. The fire was 0% contained, with evacuation orders in place.

Closer to L.A., two major fires continued to burn along the perimeter of the San Fernando Valley. As of 11 am PST Thursday, the Creek Fire near Santa Clarita was 10% contained, at 12,605 acres, while the Skirball Fire (the one next to Interstate 405 across from the Getty Center) was 20% contained at 475 acres. Both fires were putting out much less smoke than on Wednesday (see Figure 2 above), and air quality over the valley and central L.A. had improved, though moderate amounts of fine particulates were still present.

South of L.A., just a few blocks from the coast in Huntington Beach, a brush fire that broke out Thursday morning (see embedded video below) was contained in a couple of hours. There was no damage to life or property, but more than a few nerves were frayed.

Is the RRR rearing its head again?
As we noted on Monday, California weather watchers may be getting just a bit of déjà vu. A powerful upper ridge recurred along and near the West Coast for three winters in a row during the state’s five-year drought (2011-2016). The feature came to be known as the Ridiculously Resilient Ridge, a name coined by UCLA climate scientist Daniel Swain that stuck.

New research by Swain and colleagues is shedding more light on the RRR and its connections to sea-surface temperatures in the Pacific. Swain covers the current North American circulation pattern in the context of these new findings in a Monday post at California Weather Blog. The research found that there has been “an increase in the number of days each winter characterized by simultaneously very warm temperatures across the American West and very cold temperatures across the East”, like we will see during most of December 2017. Also, this pattern is “considerably more likely in a climate with rising greenhouse gas concentrations than in a hypothetical climate without human influence.”

Swain's entire post is well worth reading, but the closing paragraph is what resonates the most:

“Tropical warmth (in the West Pacific) and coolness (in the East Pacific) are both linked to different patterns of North Pacific winter ridging, and may offer an early warning of seasons with an elevated risk of dry conditions in California. Interestingly, tropical Pacific Ocean temperatures during autumn 2017 were warm in the west and cool in the east amidst a modest (and ongoing) La Niña event—a combination that suggests a substantially elevated likelihood of West Coast ridging this winter. To date, Southern California has experienced one of its driest starts to the Water Year on record, and strikingly persistent West Coast ridging is now expected to last at least two weeks. It will certainly be interesting to see how this winter plays out in the context of these new research findings.”

How changes in polar sea ice may influence rain and snow in California

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