Scattered rain showers to continue in L.A. area through Sunday afternoon

On the heels of last week’s heat wave, Southern California kicked off the long Labor Day weekend with cooler than average temperatures and scattered rain showers that are expected to continue through Sunday afternoon.

The scattered storms are possible because of a low-pressure system over Northern California that forecasters say is pulling moisture from the south. Los Angeles-area skies should be clear by Monday in most areas.

Highs across the region are expected to remain in the 70s through Sunday, with temperatures steadily warming up through the workweek, forecasters said.

Most of the Los Angeles area received some light rain Friday night that continued into Saturday morning, according to Ryan Kittell, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service in Oxnard. Light showers are expected through Sunday.

“We do expect most of the Metro area to get some sort of break [Saturday] afternoon, but mountain areas and maybe the deserts will see continued showers and maybe even a thunderstorm” through Saturday afternoon, Kittell said. After that afternoon break, light rain will likely remain present across most areas overnight and into Sunday morning.

Rain will remain light over the metro area, with coastal and valley areas likely seeing periods of light rain that add up to about a tenth of an inch of total precipitation through Sunday morning. Storms will be heavier in the mountain areas, with some regions seeing continuous rain through the afternoon and night.

With more summer rain falling so soon after last month’s tropical storm, the title lyric of Albert Hammond’s 1972 soft rock classic “It Never Rains in Southern California” rings especially false at the moment. But it is true that rain in September is not a regular occurrence in Los Angeles.

“It’s not super rare that we do see rain in September, but it doesn’t happen every year,” Kittell said.

Water typically falls from the sky in the ninth month of the year in the nation’s second-largest city about once every two to three years, according to Kittell. And when it does rain in September in Los Angeles, it typically happens later in the month, Kittell said.

Similar weather is also expected this holiday weekend in the San Francisco Bay Area, where cloudy skies are a way of life.

An “off-and-on light rain” is expected to continue across the region through the weekend, said Rick Canepa, a meteorologist at the National Weather Service San Francisco Bay Area station in Monterey.

“It’s not continuous everywhere, just patches to areas of light drizzle,” Canepa said, noting that precipitation may be a bit heavier in the Bay’s hills and mountains.

Misty skies and light drizzle are also expected in San Francisco itself, Canepa said.

Dry weather is forecast for early to mid week in the Bay Area and north Central Coast, though there may be some residual clouding.

Staff writer Ruben Vives contributed to this report.