Needed Cooldown and Moisture

5/19/2014, 1:56:12 AM

First, I am sorry I haven't posted in a while. Unfortunately, I was hit hard by sickness and had a severe case of bronchitis at the worst possible time. At a time, I wish I could have been posting about the heat, the fires and the weather coming for firefighters; I couldn’t. I am back to about 50 percent of normal now and looking forward to finally feeling better next week.

The heat this week was extraordinary in just itself. With widespread temperatures in the upper 90s and low 100s, records fell across a large area for several days. Some places set all time May records. However, to go along with the high heat was an unseasonably strong Santa Ana wind that blew for more than two days. The intensity of the winds were higher than is normal during the peak of the Santa Ana season which we are long past. Therefore there was extreme, record-breaking heat, strong Santa Ana winds, which helped drop the relative humidity to the single digits.

In these kind of conditions, the only thing between just hot weather and a disaster is one spark. I guess we will find out whether or not that spark, or in this case nine sparks, was natural in occurring. It is my opinion that it is at least quite unusual to have nine fires develop in such a short period of time over a relative small area all by natural means. Tens of thousands of people we inconvenienced and, unfortunately, there were quite a few people that had their lives turned inside out. My heart goes out to all that were affected. I hope that you can get back some normality to your lives as soon as possible.

The good news today is that a huge change in the weather is underway. An onshore flow has returned and this started to cool things off today. It still was hot by normal standards but not as extreme as it was. More significant cooling will take place through the weekend and right into early next week. Temperatures this weekend will come down 7 to 10 degrees each day and humidity levels will rise. By Sunday, even the moist marine clouds will return to coastal and mesa areas of San Diego County and up through the coastal plain of Orange and Los Angeles counties. Even more cooling is likely Monday and Tuesday, with deep marine layer by then sending clouds far into the valleys. Temperatures Monday and Tuesday will actually be lower than normal. Many places, even the valleys, may not even get out of the 60s Tuesday.

Catch me on Twitter at @Kenwxman

The views expressed are those of the author and not necessarily those of AccuWeather, Inc. or AccuWeather.com

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