Guys, it's raining! Okay, not exactly raining, but we definitely got some drizzle last night, and the downpour light misting is likely to continue until the middle of the day. According to National Weather Service meteorologist Kathy Hoxsie, this drizzling is the first rain that L.A. has seen since May.
Hoxsie, told LAist that the drizzle—which she described as "a little bit here and there" and "nothing measurable,"—sprinkled across Los Angeles this morning, "from the mountains on through the coast line."
According to Hoxsie, the precipitation is in part due to a deep marine layer, as well as a weather system that's bringing some extra moisture as it moves through. The marine layer tends to bring in the drizzle, whereas the low-pressure system tends to bring in the light rain.
Pumpkin spice latte fans itching for sweater weather will be glad to know that temperatures in both L.A. and the San Fernando and San Gabriel Valleys will be remain in the low-to-mid 70s for the rest of the day, so you can totally get away with wearing that infinity scarf on your date tonight.
Roads could get a little slippery though, as Hoxsie explained: "If we haven't had rain in a while, there's always a concern that if you get enough rain, it kind of raises the oil and the grease off the roadways, so the ground can be slick. If you get enough rain, it washes [that grease] off. I don't think in most areas we had enough to really wash it off, so we had the slick roads and the next time we get some rain it will probably be just as slick, because we really didn't get enough today to wash it off."
According to Hoxsie, the drizzling should dry up by midday in both the city and the valleys. Things will start warming up tomorrow, and by the weekend we'll have "warmer-than-normal temperatures," with balmy mid-70s weather in the L.A. basin throughout the weekend. The San Fernando and San Gabriel Valleys will be in the mid-to-upper 80s on Saturday, and slightly warmer on Sunday, when temperatures potentially slide into the low 90s.
While we had Hoxsie on the phone, we also asked her if there was any meteorology-related explanation for why the always-lovely L.A. sky was looking especially striking today.
"It's kind of a mix," she said. "What you're probably seeing is that this wasn't just a deep marine layer, we did have some low pressure that moved down from the Pacific Northwest, and that brings us puffier clouds that what we would see with just the marine layer. The marine layer tends to be a little more flat and a little more fibrous-looking. Whereas when you get a change in pressure like we did, you get puffier, whiter-type clouds."
