Southland Gets Rain, More Record-Breaking Heat

Moist and unstable air from northern Mexico sent temperatures soaring to new records in Los Angeles and San Diego on Tuesday while spawning thundershowers from the San Bernardino Mountains to Arizona.

Heavy rain was reported in the Big Bear area of San Bernardino County, where an inch of rain fell in three hours, briefly flooding streets and roadways but doing no serious damage, according to the Sheriff’s and Fire departments.

Heavy rains accompanied by hail and winds gusting to 40 m.p.h. were reported in the Morongo and Yucca valleys and south of Prescott, Ariz.--though no actual rainfall amounts were recorded.

And lighter showers and sprinkles were reported at scattered points in Orange, Riverside and Los Angeles counties.

Meanwhile, the high temperature at Los Angeles Civic Center Tuesday was 100, which thoroughly shattered the old July 9 record of 96 set in 1886.

San Diego Record

At San Diego’s Lindbergh Field, the mercury toppled the old (1968) record of 86 degrees at 10 a.m. and kept right on going until it finally topped out at 95 shortly before noon.

Death Valley and Laughlin, Nev., were the hottest spots in the nation, with 120-degree readings, but El Centro wasn’t exactly chilly at 110, Needles baked at 109 and Barstow-Daggett Airport recorded 108 degrees--just before the afternoon rains began.

The night had been a hot one too.

National Weather Service statisticians said the overnight low of 71 in central Los Angeles was two degrees above the previous record high minimum for July 9, set in 1959.

What’s more, it may have seemed even hotter because the air was heavy with moisture. Relative humidity reached 76% in Los Angeles during the night and dropped to only 24% during the afternoon.

The weather service blamed it all on a rather weak subtropical storm front that moved through the upper atmosphere.

Continued High Temperatures

Meteorologists said a hot and moist upper-level high-pressure area is expected to remain more or less stationary over Utah and Nevada during the next day or two, which should give parts of Southern California a bit of high cloudiness or haze, but not enough to make any marked difference in the temperature until the end of the week at the earliest.

The South Coast Air Quality Management District called a first-stage smog alert at 4 p.m. in the west San Gabriel Valley and predicted unhealthful air quality for today in all parts of the Los Angeles Basin, except inland Orange County, Big Bear Lake and the coastal area and low deserts.