After days of extreme winter weather that killed two women, forced evacuations and knocked out power to hundreds of thousands of residents on the West Coast, forecasters predicted Friday more life-threatening impacts from atmospheric rivers. warned of new storms over the weekend.
The first storm broke precipitation records in California, One-third of Sonoma County’s average annual precipitation and russian river Minor flood stage has been reached at the local Hacienda Bridge. San Rosa received 6.5 inches of rain in the past 24 hours, the wettest day on record since 1998.
The Humboldt County Sheriff’s Office issued an evacuation order for residents living near the Eel River, and Highway 1 was closed in Mendocino County due to flooding. An evacuation order has been issued demoted since then.
Cal Fire posted a video Thursday night of firefighters performing a quick water rescue on a flooded road north of Chico.
A rock that fell into the middle of Highway 281 in Clear Lake Riviera, California, caused an accident, blocking both lanes of Highway 20 in Sarasota Springs, California, officials said. fox weather.
In all three West Coast states, Strong wind warnings and gale warnings have been issued.with winter storm warnings in the California Cascades and Sierra Nevada.
rain and Although it continued to snow, And the weather was already preventing early Thanksgiving travel. More than 200 flights were delayed or canceled at San Francisco International Airport Friday morning, according to tracking services. flight aware.
As of Friday morning, about 185,000 customers in Washington state were still without power due to hurricane-force winds, and more than 19,500 in California were without power, the tracker said. PowerOutage.US. Washington power officials said power outages that began Tuesday could last into Saturday.
Forecasters had warned of the possibility of a second bomb cyclone, but the storm Less than expected on Thursday. of This was revealed by the media forecasting company AccuWeather. Another storm will develop in the Golden State over the weekend.
“Unlike the storms that have flooded Northern California over the past few days, the atmospheric rivers, or moisture flows, flowing into California are not as strong or violent. The area of low pressure spinning out of the Pacific Ocean is weaker. “The remaining moisture won’t be able to concentrate in one place,” said Dave Hawk, senior meteorologist at AccuWeather.
he pointed out. over 1 foot of rain The damage occurred Thursday morning in northern California cities west of Sacramento.
national weather bureau He said atmospheric rivers are being diverted away from flooded areas in Northern California, bringing beneficial rainfall from all of Central California to the central Sierra Nevada.
The long moisture plume will continue to bring heavy snow to the mountains into early Saturday morning.
Several feet of snow is possible above 7,000 feet, and very strong wind gusts are expected to taper off.
“Given that the soil is saturated, fallen trees remain a possibility and further power outages may occur,” the agency added.
“Up to 0.50 inches of rain could fall in the Los Angeles area from Sunday morning or noon through Sunday night,” AccuWeather Senior Meteorologist Heather Zehr said. “This is the highest rainfall since May 13th, when 0.13 inches of rain fell in downtown Los Angeles.”
Strong winds are also expected to continue across the northwestern coast of California, south-central Oregon, and western Washington.
high surfing advisory It occurs in Washington and can produce large waves of 20 to 24 feet and cause significant coastal erosion.
From an Associated Press report