If your rain gutters are overflowing now, wait.
Forecasters say a second storm fueled by an atmospheric river will hit California next week, roughly doubling the amount of rain that will fall in and around Los Angeles on Thursday.
In total, the city of Los Angeles is expected to receive nearly 5.9 inches from the storm that began Wednesday and is expected to peak on Sunday and Monday, the National Weather Service said this week. Totals within Los Angeles County range from 2.7 inches in Lancaster to 10.2 inches in Pine Mountain.
(Paul Duginski / Los Angeles Times)
For those keeping track at home, the amount of rain expected for Los Angeles is about three times what the city received in January. And it’s more than the city saw in all of 2020-21, according to the Los Angeles Almanac.
Here are the weather service’s precipitation projections for select cities in the region:
- fillmore: first storm 3 inches, second storm 5.3 inches, 8.3 inches total
- Lancaster: first storm 0.8 inches, second storm 1.9 inches, 2.7 inches total
- Long Beach: first storm 1.9 inches, second storm 3.5 inches, 5.4 inches total
- the Angels: first storm 2 inches, second storm 3.9 inches, 5.9 inches total
- Northridge: first storm 1.9 inches, second storm 4.2 inches, 6.1 inches total
- ojai: first storm 3.3 inches, second storm 6.5 inches, 9.7 inches total
- Oxnard: first storm 2 inches, second storm 4.8 inches, 6.7 inches total
- Pasadena: first storm 3 inches, second storm 4.5 inches, 7.5 inches total
- Paso-Robles: first storm 0.9 inches, second storm 2.2 inches, 3.1 inches total
- San Luis Bishop: first storm 1.8 inches, second storm 3.4 inches, 5.2 inches total
- Saint Barbara: first storm 2.5 inches, second storm 5.7 inches, 8.2 inches overall
The weather service offered more general projections for snowfall, saying the first storm could bring 8 to 16 inches of snow to elevations above 7,000 feet. As for the second storm, the service said, “significant and dangerous” snowfall will be possible above 6,000 feet through Monday night, with smaller amounts possible at lower elevations in the mountains. on Tuesday or Wednesday.
Forecasters expect the first storm to pass by Thursday afternoon, although San Luis Obispo and the mountains could see more precipitation on Friday.
The volume dumped by the second storm is expected to be significantly higher because the storm system is not in such a hurry to leave Southern California. The system is expected to stall “around Point Conception to the south,” the weather service said, but that point “could easily move 50 to 100 miles in either direction, so there is still some uncertainty.” However, he said, “this system will likely produce 24 to 36 hours (or more) of continuous rain.”