We welcome winter tomorrow with the winter solstice happening at 1:47pm, but it will feel more like spring entering the new season. Wednesday acts as our transition day into a warming trend as high pressure builds over the west into Christmas weekend.
While much of the country will be dealing with bitter cold temperatures, 30 to 40 degrees below average, with coldest wind chill temperatures up to 50 degrees below zero! This will be the coldest air some states have felt in 25 years. This storm is expected to be a bomb cyclone, which means it rapidly intensifies dropping 24 millibars of pressure in 24 hours.
Meanwhile, the west will be dealing with a potentially record-strong high-pressure system which will spike our temperatures 10 to 15 degrees above average this Christmas weekend. Most of the county will see 70s this holiday weekend with Christmas Day the warmest day of the stretch when we'll see 80s inland while the mountains will warm into the 60s.
The warm weather continues into early next week and the start of Kwanzaa with gradual cooling the deeper we get into next week.
King Tides will impact Southern California beaches Thursday through Sunday, peaking Friday and Saturday mornings with the highest tides near 7 ft between 8am and 9am. The high tide coincides with waves of 3 to 5 feet leading to the threat of minor flooding of low-lying beach parking lots and beach boardwalks.
Impacted beaches include, but are not limited to, Mission Beach, Pacific Beach, Seaside, Cardiff State Beaches and Oceanside Strand.
Here are the King Tide times in SoCal this week from the National Weather Service:
- Thursday: High tide 6.8 ft at 7:25 AM. Low tide -1.5 ft at 2:47 PM.
- Friday: High tide 7.0 ft at 8:08 AM. Low tide -1.8 ft at 3:33 PM.
- Saturday: High tide 7.0 ft at 8:54 AM. Low tide -1.8 ft at 4:20 PM.
- Sunday: High tide 6.7 ft at 9:42 AM. Low tide -1.5 ft at 5:08 PM.
Wednesday's Highs:
Coast: 63-67°
Inland: 67-74°
Mountains: 54-67°
Deserts: 70-74°
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