As wildfire recovery efforts continue in Southern California, Santa Ana winds are expected to return, increasing the fire risk and prolonging the containment efforts in the region. AccuWeather California Expert Ken Clark explains.

Los Angeles

More than a thousand structures have been destroyed and lives lost as wildfires sweep across parts of Los Angeles.

LA Wildfires

Santa Ana winds return to California, elevating fire risks

The Santa Ana winds are set to return to Southern California, bringing with them an increased risk of wildfires. Despite recent improvements in containment numbers and higher humidity levels aiding recovery efforts, the wind conditions are expected to worsen. The potential for strong gusts similar to those experienced two weeks prior is significant, with the possibility of wind speeds reaching 68 miles per hour in the San Gabriel mountains.

The dry air accompanying these winds will create a dangerous fire situation. Relative humidity in some areas is predicted to plummet to single digits, with dew points dropping below zero. This exceptionally dry air heightens the risk of power shutoffs, falling trees, and travel disruptions. Ken Clark of AccuWeather warns of these conditions affecting the Inland Empire and Burbank areas.

The Santa Ana winds are expected to persist with variations throughout the week, with a potential decrease in intensity midweek, followed by another increase. However, there is some expectation of a possible change in weather, with a chance of significant rainfall by the weekend which could alter the current pattern. Southern California residents can anticipate warmer temperatures, reaching into the mid-80s in the Los Angeles basin by the end of the week.



Santa Ana winds return to California, elevating fire risks

Ken Clark, last week I said, you know, we'd love to have you on here, Ken, but anytime we're talking about, you were talking about big problems in California, and it's the lack of rainfall, it's the return of the damaging winds. Let's begin with the change that we had over the weekend, the containment numbers coming up, and then what what we are forecasting for today. Certainly it was a good weekend for the firemen and recovery efforts going on. Humidities were higher, we saw very little in the way of wind of importance, but things have are changing very rapidly. In fact, I'm seeing the Santa Ana is already beginning to develop across area mountains. I had a wind gust a little before seven o'clock pacific time of 68 miles an hour up and through the San Gabriel mountains. These winds will increase as we go through the morning into the early afternoon, come down to the surface. We expect as strong of a wind event as we had two weeks ago. That's the unfortunate nature, very dangerous situation coming up, damage is likely, trees and power lines coming down, there's going to be power shutoffs, there's going to be travel problems as well. Everything we had with the last big wind event is going to happen again this time. Let's hope, let's hope we don't have any fires break out. From a weather standpoint, anything different from this particular pattern than what we were dealing with some two weeks ago? It's hard to imagine this, but actually the air is going to be a little drier with this. The relative humidities by late tonight and tomorrow are going to drop down into the low single digits to 5% area. Dew points are going to get down below zero in parts of the Inland Empire over toward Burbank area. Very, very unusual. That shows you how dry the air is. Yeah, all right. When we look ahead here, could be more winds returning as we head into the end of the week, but then also looking ahead to any kind of precipitation. Winds do die down some Tuesday night and Wednesday, and fire weather remains very high during that time period. Winds come back up again for late Wednesday night and Thursday somewhat. Then we are looking at an increased chance of some rain by Saturday through Monday, and this could be significant in the way of amounts, showers, maybe even a thunderstorm, and low snow levels. We could see snow levels down to 3-4,000 feet by the end of the weekend. So there could be a chance here for some changes in the pattern yet again as we head into the weekend and into parts of next week. We'll leave you with a closer look here at the 70 forecast across Los Angeles. We're talking about 80s by the time we head into Thursday. Yeah, and it's going to really warm up Wednesday and Thursday. Widespread upper 70s to even mid 80s across the LA basin by Thursday. All right, Ken, we appreciate your expertise, AccuWeather California expert Ken Clark. Thanks again for joining us, and we hopefully don't have to check in with you too much, but we know that this pattern, there's not going to be much change until we get significant rainfall across Southern California.

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