Weather phenomenon responsible - Heavy rainfall expected in California

The west coast of the United States will see very wet weather this weekend. Large amounts of rain are expected, particularly around Los Angeles in California.

By Sunday evening, around 60 to 80 mm of rain will have fallen. Locally, up to 100 mm are possible. This could lead to flooding and landslides.

In the Los Angeles area, more than 100 mm of rain have fallen in some places since Friday. South of San Francisco, storm gusts uprooted trees.

The cause of the heavy rainfall is a high-altitude low-pressure system over the Pacific, which is being supplied with additional moisture by a so-called atmospheric river.

This is a narrow band at low altitude that transports water vapour from the tropics to California when there is a lot of wind.