California Precipitation Snapshot; Bay Area Storm Index

The California precipitation picture got a lot prettier over the weekend; especially in Sierra Nevada which saw huge gains. For example the the southern Sierra Nevada (i.e., Tulare Basin) jumped from 103% of normal on January 1 to 165% through yesterday (January 8), while the northern and central Sierra increased to 173% and 172% respectively. See  http://ggweather.com/water/



In the San Francisco Bay Area the Sunday storm ranked as an 8.5 on the Bay Area Storm Index (BASI).  This was based on a 24-hour downtown San Francisco rainfall total of 1.62", a maximum sustained wind at SFO of 44 mph and a peak (below 1500' elevation) wind gust of 75 mph at Spring Valley in San Mateo County above Crystal Springs. This is the highest ranked storm since October 2009 (see archive).  

Jan Null, CCM
Certified Consulting Meteorologist
Golden Gate Weather Services
Email: jnull@ggweather.com
Web: http://ggweather.com
Twitter: @ggweather