Bay Area Faces Another Heat Wave This Week as Fire Risk Rises

[Updated: How to Stay Cool and Safe in a California Heat Wave]

Bay Area residents know October is usually hotter than the actual summer season. Right on schedule, forecasters expect a record-breaking heat wave during the first week of spooky month.

“We’re going to have temperatures generally 15 to 25 degrees above normal,” said Dalton Behringer, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service Bay Area office.

He said it was the perfect week to escape to the beach.

“But it might not be as much relief as people would usually expect since the coastal areas are going to heat up, too,” he said.

The National Weather Service issued a heat advisory for the entire Bay Area and Central Coast from 11 a.m. Monday to 11 p.m. Wednesday. Behringer said Tuesday will be the hottest day of the heat wave, and temperatures will begin to taper off as the week progresses. The high-pressure system building over the region, limiting the spread of coastal fog, could shatter daily heat records from Santa Rosa to San José.

“It’s certainly out of the norm in terms of normal daily temperatures, but this time of year is marked by these kinds of events where we can see these spikes like this,” Behringer said.

Residents across the region will feel the heat day and night — even on the coast. On Tuesday, San Francisco will reach the 90s, and it will be 95 in Oakland. Further inland, temperatures could reach into the triple digits. Forecasters expect Kentfield, Livermore, Redwood City, San Rafael and San José to break daily records this week.

Meteorologists have warned the hot days will add to fire danger across the region.

When the heat wave peaks on Tuesday, Concord and Livermore are expected to reach 105 degrees, said Roger Gass, a meteorologist with NWS’s Bay Area office.

“I would just recommend checking on your friends and family,” he said. “If you have any in the Bay Area, make sure that they have adequate access to cooling.”

Some parts of California, including the Bay Area, are experiencing four to five times the number of heat waves they did in the 1960s, according to Eugene Cordero, a San José State University meteorology and climate science professor.

“That difference in the number of heat waves is attributed to climate change,” he said. “This is the human signal to the change of our climate.”

The hot, dry weather has PG&E warning some residents in four Bay Area counties that they could lose electricity on Monday and Tuesday. The utility announced over the weekend that it could cut power to more than 12,000 customers across 11 counties, including customers in Alameda, Contra Costa, Sonoma and Napa counties. The utility said the shutoffs are meant to reduce the risk of wildfire from energized power lines.

On Monday morning, PG&E said it began shutting off power to several hundred customers in Butte and Shasta counties. Meanwhile, Bay Area air regulators have issued a Spare the Air alert for Monday due to unhealthy smog concentrations. The regulators said the air is particularly bad for people with heart conditions, young children and seniors.

They advise outdoor exercise only in the early morning hours. Temperatures are expected to drop again by midweek and cool back toward normal fall weather by the weekend.