Southern California rainstorms: What to expect this week

A major rainstorm will soak Southern California this week, bringing relief amid drought conditions but also dangers.

Meanwhile, an even more powerful storm system is hitting Northern California.

Here is what to expect.

Timing

Officials said much of Southern California should start seeing rain Tuesday around noon (a bit earlier in Santa Barbara and San Luis Obispo counties) and continuing through Wednesday morning. A second storm will hit Thursday early morning and last until Friday around noon.

Impacts

The National Weather Service predicts rain paired with gusty winds, with as much as 1.5 inches across the Los Angeles area for the first storm. Parts of Santa Barbara and San Luis Obispo counties are expected to get the brunt of the storm and could see as much as 3 inches of rain.

“This is a good, healthy storm that’s going to produce mostly beneficial rain, which means it shouldn’t cause a whole lot of impacts as far as flooding,” meteorologist Ryan Kittell said Monday. “Though certainly road conditions will not be great for traveling.”

Northern California

Rain and snow are already falling across that region, where a powerful storm is bringing heavy winds, high surf and the threat of flooding in some areas.

Daniel Swain, a climate scientist at UCLA, wrote in a blog post Monday that he expects heavy rain and strong winds, particularly across Northern California, due to a particularly “robust” atmospheric river, a plume of extremely moist air originating from near the Hawaiian islands and the western Pacific.