Breezy east winds developing along the coastal slopes and foothills of the mountains tonight. Weak high pressure will settle over the area for much of this week, leading to a subtle warming trend and continued dry weather. Patchy low clouds and fog may return to the coast Wednesday and Thursday.
For extreme southwestern California including Orange, San Diego, western Riverside and southwestern San Bernardino counties,
Evening update, High clouds are moving over the region this evening ahead of a very weak short wave that will move across the West Coast into Monday. Much further inland, a short wave will dig south across the central and southern Rockies with surface high pressure sliding further south. This will drive weak easterly Santa Ana winds early Monday morning into Monday night with gusts around 30-40 mph along the wind prone coastal slopes and below the San Gorgonio Pass. Otherwise minor warming on Monday with highs around 2-5 degrees above normal west of the mountains and a couple degrees below normal for the mountains and deserts.
Previous discussion, Weak high pressure looks to remain over the region by Tuesday into Wednesday as a trough moves inland across Northern California. This will continue the warmer and drier weather pattern with a slightly deeper marine layer as offshore flow weakens, bringing a better chance for low clouds to move in near the coast in the mornings. High pressure south of the region over the Pacific will strengthen further by Thursday into next weekend, leading to a warming trend. Nbm chances for highs reaching 60 degrees for areas over 5,000 feet, like Mount Laguna and Big Bear, range from 35-50% chance of occurrence by next weekend. The same chances exist for lower deserts and valleys west of the mountains to reach 80 degrees by Friday into next weekend as well. Models continue to show a drying trend as confidence in the placement of the high pressure system over our region increases, where dry weather remains in the forecast as we round out the month of January into the first few days of February.
260400z, Prevailing VFR region-wide with BKN high clouds AOA 20k ft becoming FEW-SCT after 21Z Mon. Otherwise, east winds pick up around 12z Mon with gusts 20-30 kts along coastal slopes/foothills, and downwind of the Banning Pass into the Inland Empire.
No hazardous marine conditions are expected through Thursday.
Ca, None. PZ, None.
