Weekend Warmup

Weather Story: High pressure will slowly begin to move in from our west as we head into the weekend, replacing an area of low pressure that has been sitting over the Great Basin. The low brought a cool air mass to the area and continued to encourage cool onshore flow, but it also mixed out the marine layer on Wednesday leading to increased sunshine. As it departs today, expect the marine layer to stabilize, meaning more low clouds and cooler temperatures at the coast. Inland areas will begin to warm up, however, a trend that will continue into the weekend. It will actually stay cool and somewhat cloudy on the coast until the ridge is almost overhead, when the layer will be compressed enough to allow coastal temperatures to warm up. Sunday will likely be the warmest day on the coast with highs 5-10ºF above normal. Sunday or Monday will be warmest inland with highs 10-15ºF above normal. Check out the “extended” section below for more on what happens next.


Thursday: Thick low clouds in the morning scatter out to partly cloudy on the coast in the afternoon. A bit cool for this time of year with coastal highs in the mid 50s to mid 60s and mid 60s to mid 70s inland. Breezy for inland valleys in the afternoon.

Overnight: Low clouds will fill back in overnight. Expect lows in the mid 40s on the coast with 30s to low 40s inland.  

Friday: Another day with patchy low clouds on the coast but sunshine inland. Coastal highs will remain in the upper 50s to mid-60s with inland areas mostly in the 70s. breezy for inland valleys in the afternoon and early evening.

Extended: Temperatures warm into the weekend with highs peaking on Sunday. Inland areas will be much warmer than the coast as the flow will remain onshore. Still, even on the coast, above normal temperatures should be achieved. Skies will be mostly sunny with a few low clouds on the coast and the daily blasts of valley winds are likely to persist. The ridge will flatten a bit early next week with a weak system passing through. Then, it will likely strengthen with another warm-up last next week. There seems to be some consistency in the models with a wet system breaking through by April 24^th-25^th, but that’s still out in fantasy land.

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This week's normal temperatures:
--COASTAL CITIES--
LOW: 46ºF
HIGH: 64ºF
 
--INLAND CITIES--
LOW: 42ºF
HIGH: 71ºF

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-The outlook from the Climate Prediction Center for April 22^nd – 28^th calls for the likelihood of ABOVE normal temperatures and BELOW normal precipitation. 
-El Niño/La Niña STATUS: Weak La Niña
-Forecast into Summer: Neutral

-Area drought status: Moderate drought for most of the viewing area with abnormally dry conditions in southern Monterey & San Benito Counties.