3 Storms May Hit Area by Sunday

Two Pacific storm systems are expected to bring much-needed rain to Southern California tonight and Thursday, and there’s a chance of more rain from a third storm Sunday.

None of these high-altitude storms looks big enough to put a serious dent in the prolonged winter dry spell, “but at least they’re coming in a series, and that’s the first time that’s happened in quite a while,” said Bruce Rockwell, a National Weather Service meteorologist.

The first two storms should move down the coast, one right behind the other, arriving in the Southland this afternoon and early Thursday.

“Right now, the air here is so dry that rain from the first storm, which is pretty high, might just evaporate on the way down,” Rockwell said. “But sometimes, it takes the first storm to get the air moist, and then the rain from the second will reach the ground.”

He said about a quarter of an inch of rain should fall in the Los Angeles area by Friday, with snow in the mountains above 4,500 feet.

Skies should clear Friday and Saturday, with a return of the dry offshore winds so familiar this winter, before the arrival of the third storm Sunday.

“It’s still too early to tell how much rain we’ll get from that one,” Rockwell said.

Vagaries in the high-altitude jet stream winds that propel storm systems across the Pacific are making it difficult to anticipate exactly what will happen, forecasters said. The stream is currently split, and the southern branch is picking up tropical moisture that is being funneled toward Southern California.

If the arrival of this moisture coincides with the arrival of the storms, rainfall could increase. Some of the Weather Service’s computer models say that will happen; some say it won’t.

In Los Angeles, total rainfall for the season, which runs from July 1 through June 30, currently stands at 3.95 inches. That compares with a normal for the date of 11.31 inches.

Last month was one of the driest and warmest Februaries on record.

In downtown Los Angeles, it only rained one day--Feb. 17--and only 0.29 of an inch of rain fell. That compares to a normal total for the month of 3.55 inches. In the record-setting February 1998, 13.68 inches of rain fell on the Civic Center.

The average temperature in Los Angeles last month was about 60 degrees, about eight degrees warmer than normal.