This will be my first summer living in Menifee. Am I prepared for the impending heat wave that is approaching? Sure, I go to the river every summer, where 115 degrees is the norm. But am I ready to adapt to actually living in such heat? I think that everyone who lives in this area has asked themselves that very question (save the natives).

I am lucky enough to have a house with dual air-conditioning, something I wasn't used to seeing before. I am also lucky enough to have relatives who live close by with a pool. But what about all the other people who have just moved out here within the past year? How will they prepare for when the heat blankets our community and begins to make it's presence known?

Here is a website that I found that has some ideas. Sure, most of them are common sense, but who knows, there may be something you haven't thought of.

15 Ways To Keep Cool

One of the points this website makes is to not cook, so you don't have to stand next to a hot stove (duh). Well, I don't know about everyone who lives in Menifee, but I have some words of advice:

Yellow Basket
Giovanni's
Carnita's Express

Need I say more?

Labels: Weather

Weather Currents, a weather service focusing on SW Riverside County, reports that a tornado touched down in Perris this afternoon, by the I-215 freeway near Oleander Ave, during the height of rush hour traffic...

Radio reports indicated an overturned truck on the freeway near March Air Reserve Base, and overturned railroad cars nearby.

In the aftermath, oil and fuel were in traffic lanes, the driver of the overturned truck was taken to the hospital, and traffic on the freeway was being re-routed.

Read the full news here...

http://weathercurrents.com/menifeevalley/NewsItemDisplay.do?Id=474

Here's video of the tornado, and the aftermath...
http://videos.nctimes.com/p/video?id=1895232

Labels: 215-Freeway, Perris, Weather

If you thought the rain shower we got early this morning was freaky for mid-July, there's more.

Exactly one year ago today, Menifee was hit by a freak rain storm.

Published in The Californian, on July 23, 2006, there was an article about how temperatures in Menifee reached 108 degrees the day before (July 22), and then got hit by freak rain storm that cooled things down. That rain continued on into the next day...

At 4 p.m., it was a sweltering 108 in Menifee ---- and then the storm hit.

The downpour was accompanied by high winds, with some gusts reaching 41 mph. Signs and debris were tossed about and in the Ralphs parking lot at Antelope and Newport roads, shopping carts were swept away in all directions.

http://www.nctimes.com/..../23_21_207_22_06.txt

Coincidence? Or an Al Gore conspiracy?

Labels: Weather

This afternoon I captured this guy on my cell phone camera. He was standing on the Newport Ave bridge, just as we were exiting the freeway. The temperature outside was 109 degrees F, according to the thermometer in our car.


I imagine the temperature recorded high, because the thermometer was catching the heat rising up off the asphalt. Which means, this guy was probably catching it too.

There's not much effort involved in tipping a sign up and down on a tripod, but to stand there in 109F temperature, for I don't know how many hours, has got to be tough.

How hot does the temperature have to get before a sign twirler like this guy asks himself, "Do people think I'm insane, or desperate?"

Labels: Sign-Twirling, Weather

Here's a photo of the thermometer in my backyard (in the shade), that I took today at 4:00pm...



And it's supposed to be hotter this Wednesday.

Labels: Weather

2006 apparently produced the lowest amount of rainfall in Riverside County since annual rainfall had been recorded, at just 1.93 inches. That beat out the previous low of 2.94 inches in 1883.

According to the Press Enterprise yesterday, forecasters had expected an El Nino for 2006, but it never materialized...

The immediate cause of the drought is that ocean temperatures and the jet stream did not combine to bring Southern California storm after storm in what was expected to be an El Nino year, experts said.

"An El Nino ... usually gives us wet years, but it didn't work," said Richard Minnich, a UC Riverside earth sciences professor. "One out of four create drought instead of heavy rainfall."

The Press Enterprise went on to say that because of the high rainfall we had in 2005, plus the water at Diamond Valley lake, there's plenty of reserve to last us another drought year.

I always take interest in articles that talk about Southern California drought, and water reserves. Water is the factor that sits above all the else in determining our future in Southern California. It's going to decide how much it costs to live here, if we have to move out, and even our property values.

All of Southern California is naturally a desert region. It's only because of aquaducts, reservoirs, and underground storage, that we can support these large population centers.

The way I see things, the population in Southern California keeps growing because of illegal immigration, more babies being born than people dying, and Americans moving in from other states in search of warmer weather. At some point in time, the demand for water will surpass the available supply, and create problems. Rationing can only go so far.

The Inland Valley Daily Bulletin published a water article of its own yesterday, but focuses more on dwindling supplies...

The watershed area of the Colorado River is in its eighth year of drought and is now supplying half the amount of water it did five years ago, said Andy Sienkiewich, resource implementation manager for the MWD.

The other primary imported-water area, the Sacramento Delta, only provides 60 percent of its normal supply because its source of water, the Sierra Nevada snowpack, is about a third of its usual size, Atwater said.

My question is, could Southern California ever reach a point where the population becomes so huge, that we just can't import enough water to support everyone?

Labels: Water, Weather

I was looking at the weather forecast for Menifee this weekend, and it looks like Friday is going to get cold.

Here's the current five-day forecast copied from Yahoo...


With precipitation expected on Thursday, and freezing temperatures early morning Friday, it seems like we have a recipe for snow. But I'm no meteorologist!

The National Weather Service published a "Severe Weather Alert" for Southern California, saying that the snow level may fall to as low as 900ft in the foothills and valleys...

ON FRIDAY TEMPERATURES WILL DROP ANOTHER 20 TO 25 DEGREES AND THE AIR MASS WILL BE UNSTABLE. SHOWERS AND THUNDERSTORMS ARE LIKELY TO ADD ANOTHER QUARTER OF AN INCH OF RAIN. SNOW MAY FALL AS LOW AS 900 FEET...BUT ANY ACCUMULATION IN THE FOOTHILLS AND VALLEYS IS EXPECTED TO BE SHORT LIVED AND LESS THAN AN INCH.

Does anyone remember the last time it snowed in Menifee? It was November 21, 2004. We have photos posted here:

http://www.menifee247.com/2004/11/snow-falls-in-menifee.htm

Labels: Snow, Weather

Jim Day, who lives just south of San Jacinto College in Menifee, got enough wind and rain this morning that one of his palm trees blew out of the ground.

Fortunately for him, the tree fell down in a direction that it didn't appear to do any damage to property.

At my house, we didn't see any downed trees, but did get quite a bit of wind and rain.

Labels: Weather

About 4:30pm, our home got hit with a wall of water and wind. I don't have photos, sorry. But the wind blew exceptionally hard from I've seen in a long time. The rain was coming down pretty heavy, and it few horizontally. Lasted for about 10min.

Labels: Weather

I was surprised to see snow in my yard this morning. The rain washed much of it away, there was still some on my cars. The hills by Ridgemoor Elementary School still had snow on it. I checked the thermometer in my backyard at 12:00pm, and it read 37 degrees F.


The scene at the corner of Valley and Ridgemoor Roads.


Snow scene at the corner of Murrieta and Garbani Roads.


Further up Murrieta road by the fire station, folks were playing in the snow.

Labels: Photography, Snow, Weather