A San Francisco ..."Monsoon.."

[Silas_Sancona]

As suggested over in the "Current Temperatures" Thread yesterday,  a surge of moisture ( 2nd across CA. yesterday ) had been forecast to makes it's way from down by Santa Barbara and make a rare visit to a region of CA. which rarely gets to enjoy summer thunderstorm activity.  Around/ after 2AM, compact but vigorous storms came ashore around Monterey/Santa Cruz and continue marching north/northeast across the Bay Area towards/ over Sacramento and the northern half of CA.

While not completely unheard of,  Thunderstorm activity across this area of the state is normally brief, weak and something that happens only once or twice every few years. Bigger storm events are even rarer.  Looking at some of the Twitter posts from earlier today, seems this may be one of the bigger events to occur in quite some time, both in area effected, longevity, and effects seen as it has moved over the area.. 

That said, storm activity was strong enough that severe T-storm warnings were issued with numerous reports of 35-70mph wind gusts occurring as the storms rolled through/ continue moving overhead. While some fell, doesn't look like this event was big on rainfall ( as suggested by local forecasters ) and, from what i'm seeing, there have been several small fire starts around the Bay Area so far this morning.  To add to the " rarity " factor, the area may see another round of showers/storms as another surge of moisture rotates overhead sometime tonight/ into Monday.  Guess if we're not going to get much of anything this summer, someone has to, lol..

A few posts from twitter ** Credit to the posters/ those who took pics.**

Satellite view as the storms were coming into Santa Cruz, Via Area forecaster Rob Mayeda :

Don't think i have ever seen anything like this in the Bay Area.. Something you expect to see in FL.

Some of the Peak Wind Observations, Per local NWS:

View of the storms from Pacifica: WOW!

Hope all our fellow Palm talkers there across the Bay Area/ Nor. Cal have been able to enjoy a very rare treat, in the middle of a very strange year..

Edited August 16, 2020 by Silas_Sancona
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[Silas_Sancona]

Bay Area just keeps the out of the blue summer weirdness rolling.. If the area sees another batch of storms later today/ overnight -as is currently suggested in their forecasts- this event may surpass the last epic summer T-storm outbreak here which occurred back in 2008.

Possible "Heat Burst" noted as the storms moved across the East Bay. Via Daniel Swain, Weather West.

Nice, Quick Time lapse from the same photographer who was in Pacifica as these storms rolled in.