A long-forgotten sound echoed through Northern California Wednesday: the rustling of people digging through their closets for umbrellas and raincoats.
The first significant storm in five weeks continued to shower the Bay Area with rain, bringing nearly 1 foot of snow to the Sierra at higher elevations.
It was not a flood. In the 24 hours ending at 3 p.m. Wednesday, rainfall totaled between a quarter and a half inch in most Bay Area cities, with as much as 2 inches in the Santa Cruz Mountains. But the rain eased concerns that the state would be too supportive, washed soot and dirt from the air, and improved conditions at Lake Tahoe’s ski resorts.
In short, winter is back.
And more is on tap.
“On a scale of 1 to 10, what we just had is about a 2 or 3,” said Jan Null, a meteorologist with Golden Gate Weather Services in Half Moon Bay. “Saturday or Sunday we’ll see about 6.”
Wet conditions were expected to give way to cooler, drier weather Thursday and Friday, according to the National Weather Service.
After that, more rain is forecast late Saturday into Sunday, continuing through at least next Thursday.
“We’ve gone from 65- to 75-degree days,” Null said. Now a cool, unsteady breeze is coming in. He gives us these shower times.”
The National Weather Service expects about half an inch in most Bay Area cities each day from Sunday through Tuesday. By next Thursday, 2 to 3 inches could fall across the region, raising already near-average amounts in many cities.
“We’ve had a wet season and a dry season,” Null said. “Usually those who are out, you get the normal type.”
California has had a feast-or-famine winter so far. It started off very dry in November, then peaked between Christmas and the first week of January with heavy snowstorms that saved the ski season, dumped 8 to 10 feet of snow on Sierra resorts, and generally drenched the entire state. Then the spigot turned off.
Until Tuesday and Wednesday, there hadn’t been much rain in the Bay Area since Jan. 5 – more than five weeks. A typical case was the case: high-pressure air from the West Coast that blocked incoming storms, diverted the jet stream north to Canada, where it picked up cold air and brought snowstorms to the East Coast, leaving California with shorts and T-shirt weather while the rest of the country was burning with envy.
The drought, combined with warmer-than-normal temperatures, disrupted the Sierra snowpack, the source of nearly one-third of California’s water.
On Jan. 6, was 93% of its historical average. On Wednesday, it was down to 55%.
“Since the first week of January, we haven’t seen anything,” said Andrew Schwartz, lead scientist at the UC Berkeley Central Sierra Snow Laboratory near Donner Summit. “It’s been dry and warm. Not only are we missing fresh snow, but the warm weather has melted the ice pack.”
That’s not as bad as it sounds, though.
Because the last three winters in a row have seen above-average or normal precipitation — the first such streak in 25 years — lakes across California are starting the winter with higher-than-normal levels. Schwartz said there is no time in his snow lab’s records going back to 1946 when there were four normal or above-normal winters in a row.
“Regarding the availability of water, we have a lot of water in the bank at the moment,” he said. “The problem comes when this winter ends and we enter another dry year next year, but if we are going to have a winter without rain this year, having lakes full of water is the way I would like to do it.”
As of Wednesday, all of California’s major lakes were above their historic average for mid-February, and there is no chance of a summer water impoundment.
Shasta Lake, the state’s largest reservoir, near Redding, was 78% full or 116% of its historic average. Oroville Reservoir, the second largest in Butte County, was 80% full, or 130% of normal. San Luis, between Gilroy and Los Banos, was 79% full, or 103% of average. And Diamond Valley, Southern California’s largest lake, in Riverside County, was 94% full or 128% of normal.
Several reservoirs, including Loch Lomond, the main water supply for the city of Santa Cruz, and Lake Cachuma, the largest lake in Santa Barbara County, were 100 percent full Wednesday, with water receding from their rivers.
Occasional rainfall numbers in many parts of the state are in good shape.
As of Wednesday, San Jose was at 98% of normal precipitation for the winter season, which began on October 1. Oakland was at 91%, San Francisco was at 83% and Santa Rosa was at 84%.
Cities further south were showing higher than average totals. Rainfall in the city of Los Angeles was 170% of normal, while San Diego was 139% and Fresno was 117%.
Schwartz said the storms expected Sunday into next week should bring 1 to 4 feet of new snow across the Sierra, increasing the total, but not bringing it to 100% of normal.
“We’re playing catch-up,” he said. “We won’t recover completely, but it will help. This is going to be the best week of the 10 days of the storm.”
