Hints on how A.E. Graves spends her imaginary spare time
And it is delightful to hear the sound of it…
Also, the clouds have been glorious! Blue skies are nice, but clouds can be so much more dramatic, especially as they arrive or depart. I’m a big fan of huge, puffy clouds blowing over between storms, and dramatic patterns that cast bold shadows or have the textures of quilts… They remind me that the sky has depth, not just color…
Historic, record-breaking amounts of it, even.
You've been asking for it, and we're delivering.
— NWS Bay Area (@NWSBayArea) October 25, 2021
Rainfall totals (omitting areas that are still seeing rain)
This includes rain ahead of the front as well as some lingering showers.
you can find the big list for the Bay Area here:https://t.co/tWmwafdjIv#CAwx pic.twitter.com/fH70GxxO4U
We also had some wild wind speeds, and are still under a high/dangerous surf warning.
The rain sounded great. It smelled fresh. It made row after row of fast-moving wavelets as it washed down my street. It was emotionally satisfying after yet another year when even drought-tolerant plants have dried up and died, because their very minimal water needs were not met. It was emotionally satisfying to know that this storm will likely put out those ongoing, previously unstoppable wildfires in the northern/central Sierras.
It has been so long!
There’s a good article in the Guardian about this set of storms, describing the all-or-nothing patterns as a sort of climate whiplash, which is yet another sort of extreme created by the ongoing climate crisis.
It felt good to have a REAL rainstorm.
I realize that rain isn’t considered that special, but I’m in a state with wildfires that have been burning for MONTHS, so, it is. SPECIAL. Exciting, even.
Image showing 48 hour precip totals as of 6 pm Thursday: pic.twitter.com/k5qFNwByJs
— NWS Bay Area (@NWSBayArea) October 22, 2021
There is more heading our way!
Twitter is mildly amusing at the moment, as many SF Bay Area people are wildly excited over the actuality of water falling from the sky.
The unfamiliar pitter-pat sounds on windows. The smell of petrichor. They are posting absurdly mundane videos celebrating droplets on windshields! Here in California, where fires in the mountains have burned for MONTHS, rain is a big deal.
Water! FROM THE SKY! 😄
A series of weather system will bring periods of light to moderate rainfall 🌧️ to the #BayArea & #CentralCoast through Friday. A more potent atmospheric river then takes aim on the region late in the weekend with widespread rainfall and gusty winds. Stay tuned!⚠️#CAwx #BayAreaWX pic.twitter.com/usmXHUzWfk
— NWS Bay Area (@NWSBayArea) October 20, 2021
We’d really like Wildfire Season to END.
It has been an agonizingly dry year. We only got about 30% of our hoped-for water from October of last year through September of this year. We’d really like to do better.
Here’s what the US Drought Monitor for California looks like (brace yourself, it’s bad):
If monthly numerical tables are more of your thing, here is NOAA’s data from our sad water year:
If you know people in the SF Bay Area or California generally, be prepared for their/our delight over a basic weather phenomenon that may be ordinary for you, but which feels like an incredible gift for us.
We Californians always complain about how dry it is, and how we are feeling the long term effects of climate change slowly desiccating us. But what does that LOOK like?
The UK Guardian, which has a fantastic US bureau (I am a happy digital subscriber), pulled these images together to show you what a dry spring looked like.
And it’s even drier now.
To give you a sense of how widespread this is, the US Drought Monitor (droughtmonitor.unl.edu) makes simplified graphics to show how the many different climates of California, from snowy mountain to redwood forest to foggy coast, are in various stages of water shortage.
It is HISTORICALLY dry.
This isn’t just abstract news for us. This is why trees and plants that never needed supplemental water are now dying in our local parks and gardens; why our forests are vulnerable to insects and fires; why people who retire to the Sierra foothills suddenly can’t get insurance for their homes; why salmon can’t make it out to sea from far up the rivers where they hatched; why farmers are watching their orchards from a more optimistic expansion era dry up…
We have always been zealous about drought tolerance and water conservation, but there is only so much we can do at home when the natural systems that get that water first are already dry.