California Readies for First Impacts of El Niño

The El Nino system has also created extreme floods with Brazil, Argentina, Uruguay and Paraguay experiencing the worst floods in 50 years, resulting the evacuation of more than 150,000 individuals.

Canyon News reached out to the National Weather Service, which was unavailable for comment. Los Angeles County supervisors Hilda Solis and Sheila Kuehl sent a letter to the Congress to ask for the release of the $4.5 million fund needed for the maintenance.

In the late morning hours on Wednesday, there could be some rain as strong as Tuesday’s system and it is expected to persist, said Thornton.

To the south, persistent wet conditions could put some Los Angeles County communities at risk of flash-flooding along with mud and debris flows, especially in wildfire burn areas. It is proving to be one of the most devastating ones ever, having now tied with the strongest El Niño on past records.

Additional rain expected across California through Thursday.

After all the talk, El Nino storms have finally lined up over the Pacific and started soaking drought-parched California with rain expected to last for most of the next two weeks, forecasters said Monday.

The National Weather Service estimates as much as 2 to 3 inches of rain will fall along the coast of Los Angeles and Orange counties through Thursday – a decent amount, given that the average rainfall for all of January in downtown Los Angeles is about 3 inches.

Powell said about 2 feet of fresh snow are expected to fall this week in the Sierra Nevada’s highest points. Monday night and Tuesday will see the strongest of the four, with some low-lying areas of Los Angeles expected to see some flooding.

The US Geological Survey said the magnitude-4.5 jolt on Wednesday morning and was centred two miles north of Banning, about 85 miles east of Los Angeles.

Yet, in spite of the outlook for heavy downpours, specialists say the harshness of the drought is such that one El Nino system is not going to have the ability to beat it.

A record-breaking storm has been battering California, as well as other states throughout the nation, for more than two weeks now due to the El Niño, a term given to the warming of the Pacific Ocean which causes drastic fluctuations in weather all over the world.

California has experienced three storms so far this week and the latest is expected to move slowly and powerfully, the Los Angeles Times reports. Ground delay programs, which reduce the flow of aircraft into the airport, are often triggered by weather conditions such as rain or heavy fog at SFO, Yakel said.