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Bay Area on stormwatch: First powerful storm of the season arriving Tuesday
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From "Melor" to major storm: Rainy & Windy weather soon to arrive.
Though October isn't normally considered one of our wetter months around the Bay Area, expect some rather soggy and windy changes to the forecast for the next couple days.
Locally heavy rains and gusty winds are expected to move into the Bay Area late Monday night through early Wednesday morning. This rapidly developing storm system has tapped into moisture from the system formerly known as Typhoon Melor in the Western Pacific.
This will likely add a little extra punch to the system by providing a very juicy airmass that will be directed into the coastal mountains by southwesterly winds aloft. As this moisture gets fired towards the mountains at nearly a 90 degree angle, this will provide an "orographic" or mountain-lifting feature that could yield some very impressive rainfall totals especially on the ocean-facing side of the Santa Cruz mountains.
Hydrological graphical rainfall maps suggest some areas could see as much as 6"-8" in this type of pattern, a little more or less depending on the movement of the system. Rainfall estimates for the rest of the Bay Area: San Jose/inland locations .75" to 2", coast/Peninsula: 1.5" to 3" and coastal mountains including the North Bay and Santa Cruz mountains 3"-6" (with locally higher amounts).
Winds will increase as the surface low is expected to drop to near 976 to 980 mb just to our northwest, that should encourage increasing wind speeds during the day on Tuesday. Winds will likely climb into the 20-35 mph range for a brief time with higher gusts 50 mph + near the coastline and higher hills. Winds should be strongest upon frontal passage likely late Tuesday evening.
Due to the time of year, many trees still have full crowns of leaves that may actually make wind damage a little more widespread. Those leaves can act like little parachutes, adding drag/resistance to the wind that can often result in snapping limbs and more downed trees especially for areas in the hills with saturated soil.
Rain is expected to taper off in intensity and coverage during the day on Wednesday. Other than a stray shower or two, Thursday is expected to be mainly dry with the next chance for showers arriving mainly north of the Golden Gate late on Friday into Saturday.
Latest Watches & Warnings from the National Weather Service Monterey
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