Hurricane Hilary, which quickly grew to category 4 strength off Mexico’s Pacific coast, whipping up 145mph winds, could become the first tropical storm to hit southern California in 84 years.
As the hurricane barrels northward, officials have issued the first ever tropical storm watch for the US west coast. Hurricane watches and tropical storm warnings have also been issued for parts of Baja California and mainland Mexico, where fierce winds and rain could cause flooding and landslides.
No tropical storm has made landfall in southern California since 25 September 1939, according to the National Weather Service. The watch warned of numerous potential threats to life and property including extreme flooding, mudslides and tornados.
The storm’s angle made it difficult to judge where exactly it would hit land. It was expected to gain strength Friday as it approached the Baja California peninsula, before slightly slowing over the region’s cooler waters. It could come ashore in Baja California on Sunday before hitting southern California, or skim past Baja land as a tropical storm somewhere between Los Angeles and San Diego.
Regardless, officials have warned that hammering rains could cause flash floods and landslides across the region. Parts of Baja California and the north-western coast of mainland Mexico could experience gale force winds by Friday night, as well as “life-threatening” rip current conditions by the coast, thehurricane center warned. A “dangerous storm surge” could hit western Baja California, officials said, or other parts of Mexico, depending on where the storm makes landfall.
As the storm moves north, it is expected to bring up to eight inches of rain to southern California’s mountain regions and deserts. In Death Valley national park, where a heatwave last month brought near record temperatures, rains could transform the sizzling desert landscape into a lake, meteorologists warned. Desert regions could see two to three years worth of rain fall within two or three days.
The National Blend of Models (NBM) is forecasting 3.79″ of rain for Death Valley, California, over a 3-day period. None of the climate stations in Death Valley National Park have ever recorded even 50% of that amount in a 3-day period in over a century of records. pic.twitter.com/MWrVzj36QN
— Brian Brettschneider (@Climatologist49) August 18, 2023
The storm was being driven by two weather systems – a heat dome over the central US, which will bring extreme heat to the central plains and midwest, and a low pressure area off the California coast – which were helping drive the storm northward at alarming speeds, that could bring an overwhelming amount of precipitation to the US west and south-west.
Parts of the US west could see up to three inches of rain an hour, and up to seven inches within 24 hours, “which would be exceeding rare for the region from a tropical cyclone, potentially unique for Nevada”, the National Weather Service said.
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2023-08-18 14:36:50
Link from www.theguardian.com