Unseasonably warm weather will bathe the Southland today and into Thanksgiving, but despite the heat, no red flag wildfire warnings were in force — thanks to a sharp reduction in wind speeds.
Temperatures topped out in the upper 70s along the coast and in the mid 80s in the valleys and inland areas Tuesday as high pressure and winds out of the northeast kept the skies clear and gave residents a taste of summer.
“The winds weren’t nearly as strong as anticipated, but we’ll still have warm, clear weather,” National Weather Service forecaster Curt Kaplan said. “It’ll be clear and a little breezy.”
With the winds weakening, NWS forecasters Tuesday cancelled a red flag warning that had been scheduled to go into a third day today and expire at 6 p.m. in parts of Los Angeles, Ventura and Orange counties. The warning remained in force in parts of San Diego, Riverside and San Bernardino counties.
Los Angeles should have some of the best weather in the nation on Thanksgiving, with metro highs in the 70s and low 80s. Some inland areas will push into the mid and upper 80s, he said. Overnight lows will be mostly in the 50s and 60s.
The humidity level will stay low, and temperatures will remain at least 10 degrees above normal for this time of year, according to the NWS, although today’s highs could reach 15 degrees above the norm.
The high in downtown L.A. was forecast to be 84 degrees today and Thursday, while the highs expected in Woodland Hills are 87 today and 88 on Thanksgiving.
At the same time, rain and snow is forecast for Thanksgiving in much of the Midwest and along the East Coast.
The Southland’s balmy weather should persist through Friday, Kaplan said, but a winter-style storm should arrive Sunday night and produce “significant” rain.
“We don’t know how much we’ll get yet, but it should be stronger than the storm around Halloween,” he said, adding that the rainy weather should continue through Monday morning.
The low-pressure system expected to produce rain Sunday could be a hassle for holiday travelers driving back to Los Angeles, but snow shouldn’t be a problem, Kaplan said.
“It’s coming from a little farther west (as a opposed to the Gulf of Alaska), so it’s not as cold, and we don’t expect snow to affect the I-5 corridor” in the area of The Grapevine, he said.
The NWS forecast sunny skies today and highs of 72 in Lancaster; 74 in Palmdale and San Clemente; 77 in Laguna Beach and on Mount Wilson; 78 in Newport Beach; 79 in Avalon; 80 at LAX; 83 in Pasadena and Saugus; 84 in San Gabriel, Long Beach and downtown L.A.; 85 in Burbank; 86 in Irvine and Mission Viejo; 87 in Woodland Hills, Anaheim, Fullerton and Yorba Linda. Thanksgiving temperatures will be about the same, though a degree or so higher in many communities.
