The headline looks like the whole story but it isn’t.
A huge ridge of high pressure is over The West but as I have said several times this week, it is not the kind of pattern that drives strong surface winds, and that has been the issue with the low clouds near the coast.
The offshore push has been there but too weak and the afternoon breeze is there but also not fast enough to fully mix out coastal low clouds. Models continue to call for clearing at the coast, but since the layer has defied the models it seems prudent to account for it in the forecast conditions and temperatures.
Inland the forecast is working perfectly, with more warming into the lower 90s likely.
The ridge sticks around into Sunday then big changes still look to develop. It is one of those whiplash moves in the pattern you want to think might not actually develop but models are consistently calling for much cooler air to nose in Monday and rain to develop on Tuesday and Wednesday. After that, there are some questions as to what happens next. Suffice it to say this is still a significant development.
The question then arises: how much rain? Well, models have been all over the place on this from heavy outlooks to just some scattered showers. Today is no exception. The trend today has been to back off a little, some models only show a little rain.
At this point, just inside a week out, I think the prudent call is for showers but definitely expect this outlook to be refined as we get closer. Yesterday some models called for an inch or even 2, but only one model likes it really wet today. Still, a lot can happen when this is more of a real storm vs a math storm.
