Fire weather conditions in Southern California have improved somewhat over the last 24 hours. Winds are much lighter and are now blowing onshore (W-E vs. E/NE-W/SW). The onshore wind shift is a mixed blessing, however, as these winds are now pushing the fires into areas not previously under threat. Firefighters should be able to make significant progress on many of the fires by the weekend, though some of the larger and more remote fires could still burn for days (albeit away from the most populated areas). The models are still having a hard time trying to resolve a cutoff low that will be meandering about (and probably weakening) in the Eastern Pacific by the middle of next week. The ECMWF, in particular, indicates that the low will be robust and moist enough to generate some shower activity as it moves overhead towards the middle of next week, and the GFS has a couple of runs indicating scattered shower-type scenarios. So…a minor rain event is possible next week, but at the moment, I don’t think it is particularly likely. No real rain will fall in any of CA for the next 1-2 weeks, and we may actually have to start worrying about fire danger in NorCal once again if this dry weather continues. Despite the moderate soaking rains received earlier this month across much of the northern third of the state, fuel moistures are still extremely (and perhaps suprisingly) low. All in all…the weather will be much calmer than during the dramatic Santa Ana event that occurred last week. No suprises there…

 An extra: JMELLO emailed me the following statistics from his weather station in Redlands, CA:

“These are my stats at my station in Redlands, Ca  —  One can see that where
i live i dont think October has been cool or an active rain month  — so far
the max temp is ahead last 3 years — 2004,2005,2006  — he max temps arent
that far off  bout 2 degrees

Average  Max    MIn   Mean                             Rainfall              
 
2004 **  79.4 – 51.3     65.4       HI 101 LO 41    6.07
2005 **  80.5 – 52.4     66.5       HI   97 LO 47    1.22
2006 **  79.8 – 50.8     65.3       HI   92  LO 43   0.13
2007 **  82.8  – 50.2    65.7       HI   95  LO 43   0.11 As of 10/16/07”