Remember rain? It’s coming back to Sacramento as light weekend showers form
Light rain showers in the valley and a few inches of snow in the mountains will hit this weekend, perhaps finally bringing some semblance of seasonally normal weather to Northern California.
Temperatures will also cool in Sacramento, which broke yet another daily heat record Wednesday with a high of 80 degrees measured downtown. After Thursday’s forecast high of 75 degrees, Friday through early next week will dip to the low- to mid-60s as overcast conditions arrive, according to the National Weather Service.
The NWS Sacramento office on Twitter called this weekend’s event a “quick moving system” that will bring about 0.05 inches of rainfall through most of the Sacramento Valley, with slightly more possible in the northern half of the valley.
The latest NWS forecasts for the capital city also show a chance of light showers Saturday, late Sunday night and next Monday through Wednesday, though temperatures are also expected to trend back toward the 70s by midweek.
Sacramento set 6 heat records in 9 days
Most of Northern California saw an extremely dry month of February, including Sacramento, which despite a bonus day for leap year had got its least rainfall ever: Only “trace” precipitation was reported at Sacramento Executive Airport and no rain fell at all downtown. The latter broke the record mark of 0.04 inches, set back in 1899.
Temperatures were plenty warm, too. According to NWS data, Sacramento has broken or tied daily high temperature six of the last nine days: four days in a row last Tuesday through Friday and again this Tuesday and Wednesday. The record temps ranged from 74 to 80 degrees.
Let it snow, a little bit
It won’t be a blizzard, but this weekend should see some fresh powder gracing the Sierra Nevada range.
Donner Pass is expected to get between 3 and 4 inches Saturday through Sunday morning, with Echo Pass seeing less than 2 inches, NWS forecast maps show.
Chain controls are possible as well as some delays for mountain travelers, as those snow showers should fall at pass level.
