Clean Technica | By: Steve Hanley | December 07, 2017:

Southern California is in flames. Wildfires are raging just north of Los Angeles, destroying whole communities just a short drive from downtown LA. Consuming everything in their path, the fires are only extinguished when they reach the shores of the Pacific Ocean. Commuters accustomed to massive traffic jams on the Highway 101 are now forced to run a gauntlet of flames.

Climate scientists warn that the rains that might quench the inferno are at least 6 weeks away — and may never return. Daniel Swain, a climate scientist at the University of California Los Angeles, tells The Verge, “By this time of year, usually, there’s been some rain that’s wetted things down. It’s just as dry as it was in the summer months.” His latest Tweet says it all.

The dry weather is attributable to high pressure bubbles of warm air in the jet stream above the west coast of the United States. They lead to what is known as an “atmospheric ridge” that blocks moisture-laden storms from reaching the area. They were responsible for California’s epic five-year long drought that ended in northern California recently but still persists in the southern part of the state. Now a new atmospheric ridge is forming over the west coast and Swaim says it is impossible to predict how long it will last. “We were dry before and now the prospects for rain look even less likely because of the size of this thing,” Sweet says.

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