The deadly storm that is walloping California with hurricane-force winds and record amounts of rainfall was fueled in part by the powerful weather phenomenon known as a “bomb cyclone,” according to the National Weather Service office in Monterey, Calif.
“For those keeping score, it also looks like it reached ‘bomb’ status,” a weather service forecast issued Sunday evening said.
The meteorologists who took over on Monday morning clarified that their colleagues were talking about “Bomb, meaning the intensity of the low pressure, not bomb meaning awesome.”
The meteorological term is reserved for rapidly intensifying storms that undergo a steep drop in pressure over 24 hours. That matters because wind and severe weather tends to move from areas of high pressure to low pressure.
The result is blustery conditions converging on the center of bomb cyclones. In the San Francisco Bay Area, wind gusts from the storm exceeded 100 mph and unleashed about 8 inches of rain.