You can kiss the heat wave goodbye.
That spate of record hot weather will be moving out of the area Monday night as overnight lows dip to the 50s and 60s, and Tuesday’s temperatures will drop by about 10 to 15 degrees.
By Wednesday, the National Weather Service says there’s even a chance of sprinkles with mostly cloudy skies and highs in the 60s and mid-70s, and that’ll be what we can expect throughout most of the week throughout the Southland.
Nevertheless, the last part of the heat wave broke the high temperature record at UCLA this afternoon when the mercury shot up to 89 degrees – the hottest reading for any March 16 since the last record was set five years ago.
It had been a very hot weekend in Southern California, with records being set in many areas.
The National Weather Service reported a high of 92 in downtown L.A. Sunday, breaking the record of 85 set in 1978; 88 at LAX, breaking the record of 83 set in 1959; 92 at Long Beach Airport, breaking the record of 86 set in 1978; 90 at Bob Hope Airport in Burbank, breaking the record of 86 set in 1994; 91 at UCLA, breaking the record of 83 set in 1978; 77 at Sandberg in the Antelope Valley, tying the record of 77 set in 2013.
In Orange County, Santa Ana’s 92 broke the record of 89 set in 1931 and Newport Beach’s 85 eclipsed the record 83 set in 1959.
The soon-to-be-gone heat wave was the result of a slow-moving high pressure system, according to the NWS.
More than a million people crowded Southland beaches over the weekend, and the Los Angeles marathon saw a number of runners have physical problems with the heat. Some were even treated at local hospitals. Officials, however, had tried to make conditions a bit more comfortable for runners by moving up the start time by a half hour due to the expected high temperatures.
— City News Service