Hurricane Hilary

[WxWatcher007]

 

[mob1]

32 minutes ago, GaWx said:

 It looks to me that Las Vegas will dodge the proverbial bullet as model consensus suggested ~2" was quite possible for the Fri-Mon period, including the Fri monsoon. Right now they're near 0.70" with ~1" total for Fri-Mon, if that, looking much more likely than anything close to 2" total. So far, the only flash flooding was 4-5PM Fri from the monsoon, not Hilary.

There are some incredibly heavy training cells not too far to their west. They're slowly making their way eastward so LV will likely miss the worst of it, but areas to their immediate northwest might still see some prolific flooding. Red Rock Canyon national park is going to take it on the chin. 

[CheeselandSkies]

Flash Flood Statement
National Weather Service Los Angeles/Oxnard CA
650 PM PDT Sun Aug 20 2023

CAC037-211000-
/O.CON.KLOX.FF.W.0024.000000T0000Z-230821T1000Z/
/00000.0.ER.000000T0000Z.000000T0000Z.000000T0000Z.OO/
Los Angeles CA-
650 PM PDT Sun Aug 20 2023

...FLASH FLOOD WARNING REMAINS IN EFFECT UNTIL 3 AM PDT MONDAY FOR
LOS ANGELES COUNTY...

At 650 PM PDT, a DANGEROUS AND LIFE THREATENING FLASH FLOODING
SITUATION is developing from Point Mugu and Camarillo eastward
through Thousand Oaks and Woodland Hills area and across the
mountains of Los Angeles County. Local law enforcement reported
flash flooding across the warned area, vehicles have been stranded.
Between 1 and 4 inches of rain have fallen, except 3 to 6 inches in
the mountains. Additional rainfall amounts of 1 to 4 inches are
possible in the warned area.

HAZARD...Life threatening flash flooding. Heavy rain from
         Tropical Storm Hilary is producing flash flooding.

SOURCE...Law enforcement reported.

IMPACT...Life threatening flash flooding of creeks and streams,
         urban areas, highways, streets and underpasses.

Some locations that will experience flash flooding include...
  Thousand Oaks, Malibu, Lake Los Angeles, Acton, Wrightwood,
  Burbank, Palmdale, Mount Wilson, Pasadena, North Hollywood,
  Griffith Park, Santa Clarita, Universal City, Van Nuys, Lancaster,
  Hollywood, Alhambra, Northridge, Downtown Los Angeles and Beverly
  Hills.

PRECAUTIONARY/PREPAREDNESS ACTIONS...

Turn around, don't drown when encountering flooded roads. Most flood
deaths occur in vehicles.

Be especially cautious at night when it is harder to recognize the
dangers of flooding.

&&

LAT...LON 3405 11894 3408 11894 3417 11879 3417 11867
      3424 11867 3424 11863 3482 11889 3482 11767
      3429 11765 3402 11773 3402 11777 3398 11780
      3395 11778 3397 11871 3402 11903 3408 11903

FLASH FLOOD...OBSERVED
FLASH FLOOD DAMAGE THREAT...CONSIDERABLE

[SolidIcewx]

Some tor signatures popping up hopefully stay radar indicated. 

[Normandy]

Starting to get some orographic enhancement from the San Bernardino mountains.  Solid band of rain me of LA and E if LA

[NJwx85]

The back edge of the rain shield is close to clearing the coast.

[Ed, snow and hurricane fan]

I only wish I knew where in California.  Stationed there 4 years then had a summer job in Bakersfield in 1992. 

 

[WxWatcher007]

 

[Random Chaos]

Some insane totals estimated in the mountains north of LA:

https://mrms.nssl.noaa.gov/qvs/product_viewer/ - Q3 Multisensor, 24 hr:

[Nibor]

Been having discussions with friends in LA whether or not the heavy rainfall can cause a quake. The official stance by the USGS is here. In short, no but maybe? Lol

[smokeybandit]

I can't imagine the quake has anything to do with the rain. It wasn't that much rain, and not that much rain had fallen when the quake happened.

[olafminesaw]

Models did pretty well at handling QPF for Socal. 

[GaWx]

14 hours ago, GaWx said:

 It looks to me that Las Vegas will dodge the proverbial bullet as model consensus suggested ~2" was quite possible for the Fri-Mon period, including the Fri monsoon. Right now they're near 0.70" with ~1" total for Fri-Mon, if that, looking much more likely than anything close to 2" total. So far, the only flash flooding was 4-5PM Fri from the monsoon, not Hilary.

 For Fri-Sun (8/18-20), LV has received 0.85" with ~0.55" of it from Hilary. They're very fortunate considering the ~2" progged by model consensus Fri through today and with it currently looking like little for today. Definitely an underachiever there, which is great news for them.

[NorthHillsWx]

What’s the verdict on how this event panned out from a human impact standpoint? Lots of dire rhetoric going into it but I haven’t seen or heard of much in the news other than some light flooding around LA 

[bluewave]

4 hours ago, NorthHillsWx said:

What’s the verdict on how this event panned out from a human impact standpoint? Lots of dire rhetoric going into it but I haven’t seen or heard of much in the news other than some light flooding around LA 

Pretty close to the forecasts. The most extreme rainfall relative to annual averages remained in the deserts as expected. Death Valley had their rainiest day on record. This was equal to a full year of precipitation surpassing the record set just last summer. 
 

 

[NorthHillsWx]

Last word on Hilary as the coverage and hyperbole really struck a nerve with me: it is now the 9th story on CNN.COM and isn’t even on FoxNews homepage the day after a “catastrophic event”. Maybe a rainstorm hitting a place that’s needed it the most isn’t such a bad thing? I get that there was flooding and there are probably some impressive videos at washes (which flood impressively after an isolated storm). I also get some places broke all time rainfall records. However, even in a desert, 2” of rain falling over 24 hours isn’t going to lead to the apocalypse. You’re talking about less than 0.09” an hour. A lot of this storm was lighter rain which is exactly what this region needed (I know I saw the flooding videos from washes). Rant over. I just think days in advance people were calling this a catastrophe and it was very clearly going to be the exact kind of rain event the region needed to put the nail in the coffin of the perma drought 

[KPITSnow]

7 hours ago, NorthHillsWx said:

Last word on Hilary as the coverage and hyperbole really struck a nerve with me: it is now the 9th story on CNN.COM and isn’t even on FoxNews homepage the day after a “catastrophic event”. Maybe a rainstorm hitting a place that’s needed it the most isn’t such a bad thing? I get that there was flooding and there are probably some impressive videos at washes (which flood impressively after an isolated storm). I also get some places broke all time rainfall records. However, even in a desert, 2” of rain falling over 24 hours isn’t going to lead to the apocalypse. You’re talking about less than 0.09” an hour. A lot of this storm was lighter rain which is exactly what this region needed (I know I saw the flooding videos from washes). Rant over. I just think days in advance people were calling this a catastrophe and it was very clearly going to be the exact kind of rain event the region needed to put the nail in the coffin of the perma drought 

People that get mad because they feel media or anyone else overhype storms are the worst. 

 

I would always much rather hype too Much than too little. 

[sokolow]

On 8/21/2023 at 10:43 PM, NorthHillsWx said:

Rant over. I just think days in advance people were calling this a catastrophe and it was very clearly going to be the exact kind of rain event the region needed to put the nail in the coffin of the perma drought 

The time of rejoicing & jubilee for CA, the Great Basin, and the Colorado plateau started in November last year, when those regions started loading in record and near-record snowpacks.  IMO There’s nothing more beautiful than the smell and feel of soft rain in alpine semidesert.

Snowfall on Kolob Reservoir Road, November 2022

 

As Jay Lund and Andrew Rypel commented at California Water Blog in March this year, California’s drought was largely over in terms of soil moisture, snowpack, and reservoir storage.  However, they also note that the preceding years of intense drought left what might be described as a huge hydrologic debt and the state still in a condition of chronic water overdraft.  Put in groundwater terms, they wrote:

Quote

California relies on groundwater overdraft for about 2 million acre-ft/year of its water use. This, plus reductions of water availability from climate change and more modest increases in environmental flows for rivers, mean fallowing 1-2 million acres of irrigated land in California is unavoidable, mostly in the southern Central Valley. Retiring land from irrigated agriculture will be the main approach for responding to chronic water shortages. This is difficult for policy-makers to accept, as evidenced by extended disproportionate rhetoric on expanding surface storage and groundwater recharge. New expanded surface storage and aquifer recharge are useful cards, but not nearly enough for a full deck. This problem is important enough that we should play with a full deck.

 

As to Hilary, the most concise and clear statement I saw was in a news item from CBS Los Angeles, which gives some commentary from resource manager from the CDWR,

Quote

 

"Most of the reservoirs in the state are in very good shape, but that's because of this wet winter and spring that we had," said Jeanine Jones, with the California Department of Water Resources. "This one storm moving through very quickly, really not terribly significant."

Days before the storm's arrival, the U.S. Drought Monitor released the latest drought map of California, showing that the vast majority of the state is completely without drought for the first time in years. 

"The obvious thing to say is fall is generally Southern California's peak or most active fire season, when the Santa Ana winds begin to kick in," she said. "As long as these storms don't spark lightning, which causes fires, generally speaking, dampening things down during warm summer months is usually good."

 

In short, I agree there might be cause to be annoyed by misplaced / absent post-Hilary coverage of what was a very usual and potentially dangerous weather event.  However, I think the reason is seen in this pull from the NYT:

Quote

 

California Evades Catastrophic Damage From Rare Tropical Storm

“I can’t remember a major storm in which we had no fatalities,” Zev Yaroslavsky, a former Los Angeles county supervisor and city councilman, said Monday. “We were prepared and, as a result, we made our own luck.”

 

Emphasis mine; basically what we can say is that the many and varied government and private organizations involved in emergency management did a really good job forecasting, communicating, and responding to this hazard.  They warned and protected the public, and people in general did a good job taking measures to prepare themselves, their families, and their communities.  That’s not a bad thing at all, and should be talked about.