Skies Could Thunder--and That Would Be Good

The rain that was expected to trickle into Orange County late Monday could become a full-fledged thunderstorm today and leave the region soaked with intermittent rain until early Wednesday, according to forecasters, who dubbed it good news.

“The good news is that you’ve almost doubled your average rainfall for the season” that began July 1, said Curtis Brack, a forecaster with the Wichita, Kan.-based WeatherData Inc., which prepares weather information for The Times. “It’s also good news that you haven’t had it all at once. In fact, that may be the best news of all.”

Brack drew a sharp contrast between the county’s current weather pattern and that of January 1995, when a sudden, ferocious thunderstorm pummeled the region with six inches of rain in a two-hour period one afternoon and raised the monthly totals to more than 14 inches and more than $40 million in damages.

Both Brack and Mel Newman of the county’s Public Facilities and Resources Departmentsaid the region’s seasonal rainfall total of 14.3 inches--almost double the seasonal norm of 7.6 inches--is ample proof that the Southern California drought of 1988 to 1993 is but a distant memory.

“Knock on wood . . . “ Newman said, “but we’re way ahead of where we should be at this time of year.”

Another key difference between this year and past seasons is that the so-called rainy season actually began in November, even before Thanksgiving and months ahead of schedule, Newman said.

“Ordinarily, we have a lot of rain in January and February, and we expect that,” he added, “but we got rain as early as November, when a couple of pretty good storms rolled in.”

So far, the steady showers coupled with a lack of flooding have produced nary an unpleasant side effect. Agricultural officials say the regional strawberry crop is doing well, with the rain having produced only ripe, juicy strawberries, none of which seem to be suffering from thirst.