The Sun Is Back, Alright

Temperatures are warming up! At least for a day… High pressure to our west will push back toward us and strengthen, warming the air mass overhead by as much as 8ºF and squishing the marine layer. Yes, despite the sunshine we’ve seen over the past few days, the marine layer is still there, it is just less stable and somewhat dryer. You can thank the northwest flow for that! And that really isn’t going to change for the rest of the week. With that said, the trough over the Western U.S. will “build” back westward out of mid-week and we’ll see a cool-down as we head into the weekend and probably an increase in low clouds.

AIR QUALITY: Good to Moderate

Overnight: Low clouds fill the coast and major valleys. Patchy fog possible in the coastal hills. Areas of smoke in southern Monterey County near Camp Roberts. Lows in the low 50s on the coast and mid 30s to around 50ºF inland.

Tuesday: Becoming mostly sunny with a few low clouds on the coast. Warmer, with coastal highs in the low 60s to low 70s—warmest on the north side of the bay—and 70s to upper 80s inland. Gusty northwesterly onshore and up-valley winds late in the day.

Wednesday: Slightly cooler with a few low clouds lingering on the coast during the afternoon. Coastal highs in the 60s to around 70ºF—warmest on the north side of the bay—and upper 60s to mid 80s inland. Gusty northwesterly onshore and up-valley winds late in the day.

Extended: Temperatures cool off into the weekend, bottoming out on Friday, before slowly rising through the holiday weekend as high pressure builds back in. We’ll see our daily cycle of low clouds on the coast with morning overcast and afternoon sun. Northwesterly winds will remain gusty at times. At the moment, highs look to be above normal on Memorial Day.

*Note: Any alerts from the National Weather Service in Monterey will be noted in italics above. Alerts may be edited for brevity or local clarification (in parenthesis).

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This week's normal temperatures:
--COASTAL CITIES--
LOW: 50ºF
HIGH: 66ºF

--INLAND CITIES--
LOW: 47ºF
HIGH: 76ºF
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-The outlook from the Climate Prediction Center for May 28^th -  June 3^rd calls for the likelihood of near normal temperatures and BELOW normal precipitation.

- ENSO (El Niño/La Niña) STATUS: El Niño Advisory, La Niña Watch
- ENSO Forecast: Transition from El Niño to neutral soon and then to La Niña by summer.
-Area drought status: Currently drought-free
-Monterey Bay Sea Surface Temperature* as of May 20^th: 56.1ºF
(Historic May AVG: 55.8ºF)
*average of three buoys