Big Drop in Temps Wednesday

Your forecast for Monterey, Santa Cruz, San Benito, and southern Santa Clara Counties…

Wednesday will be much different! A dry subtropical low to our south will migrate northward, cooling temperatures aloft and allowing for the deepening of the marine layer—which will also be reinforced by a weak cold front moving down the coast. Temperatures will drop 5-15ºF on the coast and 10-20ºF inland day to day! That, and low clouds will return to the coast and may not let up throughout the day. We’ll have a similarly cool (and coastal cloudy) day on Thursday as the low passes by, then warm up a bit on Friday as the ridge nudges back in from the southwest.

AIR QUALITY: Good to Moderate

Wednesday: Low clouds remain flush with the coast for most of the day with hazy conditions. Cooler, with highs in the 60s. Inland areas will be mostly sunny with a few high clouds possible. Cooler as well, with highs in the upper 60s to upper 80s. Breezy westerly onshore and up-valley winds late in the day. Low clouds will start to move back inland come this evening.

Overnight: A deeper marine layer will allow low clouds to spill over into many interior valleys, and allow for some light coastal drizzle. Areas of patchy fog also possible come dawn. Lows will be mild with mostly low to mid 50s across the region, upper 40s for sheltered valleys.

Thursday: A cloudy start for most, then another mostly cloudy day on the coast with highs in the 60s. Mostly sunny inland with upper 60s to upper 80s. Breezy onshore winds becoming windy in the valleys late in the day.

Extended: Temperatures warm on Friday with an increase in coastal sunshine. Then, we’ll get back into a more progressive pattern with west to east movement just to our north keeping the blocking ridges away. The result will be seasonable temperatures but gusty northwesterly winds at times really through the weekend into early next week.

*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: 52ºF
HIGH: 68ºF

--INLAND CITIES--
LOW: 49ºF
HIGH: 81ºF
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-The outlook from the Climate Prediction Center for June 19^th – 25^th calls for the likelihood of ABOVE normal temperatures and near 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 June 12^th : 56.3ºF
(Historic June AVG: 56.7ºF)
*average of three buoys