Thursday Santa Maria set a record low with 29 degrees and Friday only missed a record low by 1 degree. Paso Robles was 23 Friday morning and the record low was 25, a record which was stood since 1953. Most of the rest of the area has only narrowly missed record lows of their own by a few degrees.
The Central Coast entered the cold snap after the Tuesday storm system exited the area leaving behind a pattern that locked cold and dry air in place under generally clear skies.
Again Friday night into Saturday morning skies will be clear and temperatures will be cold. The only advisory in place tonight is a frost advisory for the west-facing Central Coast for scattered areas of freezing lows. Such temperatures are rare for coastal areas and since some management is required the advisory was issued. Interestingly the coldest area will be the SLO County interior again, but no advisories are in place since freezing lows are more common in this area and several hard freezes have taken place this week. In other words, any damage that would be done has already likely been done.
Daytime highs are slowly climbing to near average. This warming trend will continue thru the weekend. Some 70-degree highs will happen this weekend and mid-70s to near 80-degree highs will arrive early next week as high pressure becomes dominant again.
Models continue to be generally in agreement that the next chance for rain is March 8th-11th or 12th.
Several fast-moving and cold areas of low pressure look to tumble thru the Central Coast. Unfortunately like recent systems these look moisture-deprived. Right now outlooks suggest local rainfall would stay under .25" (likely far under). At this point, if the end of March doesn't get significantly active the 2021-2022 rain season will continue to build more significant deficits. The last two weeks have seen minor increases in drought in NorCal.
