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Dangerous air quality & fire weather in Ventura Thursday, abrupt change this weekend

More Santa Ana winds arrive Thursday. These winds enhance early in morning with gusts near 50mph. This will bring toxic air, smoke, ash and air quality issues from the Hughes fire into the coverage zone. Main impacts with air quality will be down in Ventura as winds directly bring smoke into the city. Keep an eye on those with respiratory issues and avoid strenuous activity outside. We will likely see haze and smoke in Santa Barbara County as the Hughes Fire rages on, keep windows closed. Fire weather concerns arise today as winds strengthen and dangerously low humidity values hold strong. Red Flag Warnings are still in place in Ventura County. While Santa Barbara and Ventura County are not underneath a Red Flag Warning, we are close to those thresholds, so use caution when heading out the door. Temperatures soar into the 70s and 80s and skies stay clear for areas north of Gaviota. Overnight lows cool into the 20s and 30s for most wind sheltered areas and coastline cools into the 40s.

Winds finally end by Friday. Red Flag Warnings will continue through Friday 10 am due to dry conditions. Temperatures drop significantly as onshore flown returns and a potent low pressure system arrives. Skies turn cloudy by the evening and winds pick up from the northwest, rising humidity. Highs warm into the 60s and 70s and cool down into the 30s and 40s.

Thunderstorms remain to be the wildcard of the forecast. An "inside slider" or low pressure that drops south from Canada will rush into the Central Coast Saturday. This particular system looks to shift further to the west meaning beneficial light showers and rain, although the track of this system will impact us greatly. If it moves 50-100 miles further to the west, then we will see higher rain and snow totals. If the system moves to the east, we may get no rain. The current track shows the low hovering over the Central Coast for at least a 2 day time span. This means rainfall numbers close to half an inch in Santa Barbara and closer to an inch in LA counties. There is a wide range of outcomes when it comes to rainfall totals due to the path and how notoriously hard these systems are to forecast. Rainfall rates are around a quarter of an inch per hour, this will be beneficial rain that will mitigate the fire weather concerns. As we head into Monday and Tuesday we begin to dry out and a stagnant weather pattern arrives.

Article Topic Follows: Local Forecast

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Mackenzie Lake

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