The forecast proved to be prophetic. A Category 4 atmospheric river would bring copious amounts of rain to the San Francisco Bay Area. But no one was really ready for just how much would fall.
By the time the storm ended, San Francisco would receive 5.46 inches of rain over a 24-hour period.
“This makes it the second wettest day in the 170+ years of records at that site, just 0.08″ less than 1st place (11/5/1994) with 5.54,” the National Weather Service said. “This rainfall also made up 46.8% of San Francisco’s December rainfall.” To put that into perspective, it was the second wettest day since the Gold Rush.
The result was a day of neighborhood flooding and and landslides. In the Marina District, city workers shut down Marina Boulevard due to flooding. Some garages and homes on the street were under water. In the East Bay, residents had to be evacuated by boats as water flooded their houses.
San Francisco’s department of emergency management urged drivers to stay off roads amid the extreme weather. Highway 101 — a major freeway connecting San Francisco to the Peninsula — was completely shutdown by flooding for much of the day.
In neighboring mountain regions, some ski areas actually had to shut down temporarily due to too much snowfall.
“We are in for an extended wet pattern where these saturated soils won’t have time to really dry out,” the weather service said. “The only break we get from rain will happen on Jan 1, but then more rain occur Jan 2-5 with a third moderate atmospheric river moving into our region around Jan 4-5.”
“At this time, the rain totals look to be similar or a little higher than what we saw on Dec 26-27 and what we saw Saturday. Expect several more inches. After Jan 5, it seems light to moderate rain could persist into the second week of January. If that’s the case, then residents across the Bay Area and Central CA need to be aware that additional flooding and shallow mudslides could occur.”
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