A third winter storm is on its way to California, with forecasts anticipating that it will hit the Golden State on Friday, only days after a bomb cyclone unleashed hurricane-force winds across the Pacific Northwest and an atmospheric river brought a deluge of rain and snow.
The bomb cyclone brought dangerous weather conditions across the Pacific Northwest earlier this week, causing power outages for more than half a million people and killing at least two. Multiple winter-weather-related warnings remained in place as of Thursday evening, according to the National Weather Service (NWS). The bomb cyclone also ushered in an atmospheric river, which brought heavy rainfall to California.
A bomb cyclone occurs when a storm's pressure drops quickly, which intensifies the storm and ramps up wind gusts. Atmospheric rivers are a "long, narrow region in the atmosphere—like rivers in the sky—that transport most of the water vapor outside of the tropics," according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.
Now, meteorologists have fixed their attention on a third storm expected to arrive by this weekend.
"Developing storm system forecast to bring another round of gusty winds to the Pacific Northwest on Friday with heavy mountain snow spreading toward the northern Rockies this weekend," the NWS Weather Prediction Center posted on X (formerly Twitter) on Thursday morning.
NWS Weather Prediction Center meteorologist Joe Wegman told Newsweek that the incoming storm will enhance the atmospheric river as it follows a similar track.
"That's why the worst and heaviest rain of the whole event for Northern California is going to be tonight," he said.
The storms are part of a broader weather pattern in which atmospheric conditions are steering the storm systems to the Pacific coastline.
The incoming storm won't be nearly as strong as the bomb cyclone, Wegman said, though the heavy rain impacts will be similar.
"It's following so soon after the first one, that's why the flooding concerns are much greater with the second one," he said.
A flood threat remains over the Pacific Northwest through early Saturday, the forecast said.
"Several inches of rainfall are still possible, around 5-7 inches remain possible over 48 hours with isolated areas in terrain to see 10 + inches of rain," the Thursday forecast said.
It continued: "Northern California is under a High Risk for Excessive Rainfall and a Moderate Risk goes northward into southern Oregon. For Friday, the atmospheric river will be waning, but the atmosphere may still drop a couple of more inches of rain onto saturated soils."
Rain totals will be higher than 3 inches in the Sierra Nevada, with high snow levels as well.
Some parts of Northern California had received nearly a foot of rain, based on Thursday morning totals, with more falling throughout the day. Some areas broke records for their rainfall, including the Sonoma County Airport, which broke its all-time record of 6.09 inches by nearly an inch of rain.
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