California is taking a beating from an unusually destructive 2026 hurricane season

Filed 1h ago · Via The Conversation · The Buffoon Desk

THIS STORY IS SCORED

Super Circus

Kevin MacLeod · incompetech.com · CC BY 4.0

Photo: Jack de Nijs for Anefo · CC0 · via Wikimedia Commons

Southern California received its second-ever tropical storm watch as Tropical Storm Rachel approached in October, bringing high tides, coastal flooding and heavy rain before weakening and making landfall in Baja California. Rachel dumped up to six inches of rain on parts of Southern California, triggered flooding as far away as Las Vegas, and followed a string of unusual 2026 season events including three hurricanes hitting Hawaii and Hurricane Marie damaging Los Angeles-area homes in September.

Historical precedent is thin but real: an 1858 hurricane brushed San Diego, and a 1939 storm made the only known direct California landfall, prompting the Weather Bureau to open a Southern California office. El Niño conditions and anomalously warm water off Baja California are cited as the main reasons these storms can now survive long enough to reach a coastline usually too cold to sustain them.

The full dispatch is available from the source below.

✒ FROM THE EDITORIAL DESK

You spend your whole life telling people California does not do hurricanes, and then the ocean goes and does three in one season just to make you a liar. The water got warm enough that the old rules stopped applying, and the only people surprised are the ones who never read the 1939 file. A inch of rain in San Diego does not sound like much until you remember the storm drains there were built by people who never expected to need them.

Source: Read the original at The Conversation → Scored: Super Circus · Kevin MacLeod · CC BY 4.0