Stanislaus County sees rain and cold, but dry weather in forecast as it dodges major storm
It’s rainy and cold in Stanislaus County now, but the National Weather Service said that won’t last long.
Light rain and scattered showers came to the area on Friday afternoon. The NWS estimated that one-tenth of an inch of rain fell on Friday. — adding to a drier-than-usual fall/winter.
Rain totals are below average for this time of year, according to Idamis Shoemaker, lead meteorologist at the NWS Sacramento station. Since October about 3.6 inches of rain dropped in the area. The average for Stanislaus County is about 4 inches this time of year.
Dry weather was forecast for the weekend and into next week, Shoemaker said.
Historically, the past two years were very wet. For rain year 2022-2023 (which runs from July 1 to June 30), Modesto saw nearly 19 inches of precipitation — the most in the past 24 years. Rain year 2023-2024 totaled just over 15 inches, according to the Modesto Irrigation District.
Modesto dodges big storm
The Modesto area appears to have dodged a storm system that will cause a domino effect of inclement weather further east.
In northern California and the Pacific Northwest, a storm produced heavy low-elevation rain and high-elevation snow on Friday. It was forecast to continue inland Friday night and into Saturday through the Great Basin, then into the Rocky Mountains.
The system will be the “primary driver” for the expected widespread, major winter storm from the Northern to the Central Plains, Lower Missouri Valley, Mid-Mississippi Valley, Ohio Valley, Central Appalachians into the Mid-Atlantic over the next few days, according to the NWS.
Travelers to these areas were warned that nearly a foot of snow is possible.
“Travel of all kinds will likely be very difficult and extremely dangerous across both the expected heavy snow and significant icing areas,” read an NWS briefing.
Weekend temperatures in Modesto were forecast to be in the mid-50’s on the high end and in the low-40’s on the low end.
