The Bay Area’s weather over the weekend will continue to play out like a rerun. The marine layer will have varying degrees of influence on the daily temperatures from Friday to Sunday, but never quite make it far enough inland to call it a complete takeover.
Most of the region will break out of the clouds between 9 and 11 a.m. on Friday, Saturday and Sunday, and temperatures will be the warmest (mid- to upper 80s) in the interior East Bay and Wine Country. Along the bay, including Oakland, San Francisco, temperatures will settle in the 60s and 70s, cooler along the Pacific Ocean.
It may not seem like it, but the rinse-and-repeat nature of the weekend forecast has fingerprints of the emerging historically strong El Niño, and it can offer us clues as to what to expect for the rest of August and the start of September.
California has spent a good chunk of the summer caught between two competing weather systems: a warm and active Pacific Ocean and a strong high pressure system anchored over the Four Corners. In the middle, little storm systems keep reloading close to the California coast, keeping the marine layer in play and extreme heat at bay. It’s also kept the fire season in check as no extended periods of dry, offshore wind patterns have been able to form…