Road & Weather Update, 12/4/09

Spoke with Charlie Hench, Cal-Trans Engineer, this morning regarding the impact of the weather on the predicted night closure of Highway One between Ragged Point and the county line. He said, “Just because it rains, doesn’t mean the drilling won’t go on. It’s a safety issue.” He explained that each day the call would be made about whether to drill that night, and Charlie will then make the calls to notify people, including this reporter. This is a tough one for Cal-Trans, and for the traveling public. The work needs to be done to save the road, and cannot be done without closing the road from 8 pm until 5 am for four nights. The “official” news release for this came in today and is posted on the Cal-Trans page.

On the weather front this from the NOAA discussion:
“THE LATEST NAM12 AND GFS MODELS ARE INDC A SHIFT IN THE FCST THINKING FOR SUN THROUGH MON. WILL WAIT TIL THE 12Z ECMWF…WHICH WAS TRENDING COLDER TOO BEFORE MAKING ANY CHANGES. HOWEVER…IT IS LOOKING LIKE IT COULD BE COLD AND SHOWERY SUN NIGHT/MON MRNG WITH LOW SNOW LEVELS. IF IT CLEARS OUT MON NIGHT THERE COULD BE A FREEZE.”

So, I will update this again tonight, as bigsurkate is now on weather watch for the next week.