Speaker 1: Welcome to brain Stuff, a production of iHeart Radio. Hey
Speaker 1: brain Stuff, Lauren Vogelbaum. Here, when the Santa Ana winds
Speaker 1: blow in southern California, everyone takes notice, too many in
Speaker 1: the region, writers, singers, poets, and everyone else. They're a harbinger,
Speaker 1: mostly of no good. Scientifically speaking, the Santa Anna's are
Speaker 1: something else, entirely a perennial natural phenomenon whose future effects
Speaker 1: are now warped by a warming planet. Climate scientist Alexander
Speaker 1: Gershnov with the scripts Institution of Oceanography at UC San
Speaker 1: Diego told the university's news service in early nineteen climate
Speaker 1: change has been projected to lengthen the dry season in
Speaker 1: California and other Mediterranean climate regions, making vegetation more likely
Speaker 1: to remain dry into December. These changes, together with the
Speaker 1: projected lessening of least season Santa Ana winds, suggest that
Speaker 1: southern California's wildfire season could shift toward winter, longer, more
Speaker 1: dangerous dry seasons, wildfires raging later in the year, changes
Speaker 1: in the winds. It's potentially dramatic stuff. It might seem
Speaker 1: the stuff of Hollywood, but let's back up a step.
Speaker 1: Santa Ana winds are dry and warm winds from the
Speaker 1: Great Basin, an area that incorporates large parts of the
Speaker 1: states of Nevada and Utah. The winds start in the
Speaker 1: basins inland deserts east and north of southern California, and
Speaker 1: then flow downward, taking a turn toward the Pacific Ocean.
Speaker 1: The Santa Anna's are usually, but not always, late year
Speaker 1: winds that form when the weather is cooler in the
Speaker 1: Great Basin. They don't begin in hot deserts. They actually
Speaker 1: start off as cool winds and are pushed towards southern
Speaker 1: California by high pressure systems. But as the wind's head
Speaker 1: down slope, they get both warmer because air generally heats
Speaker 1: up as it descends, and drier air only a mile
Speaker 1: above your head right now maybe some thirty degrees fahrenheit
Speaker 1: warmer than the air around you. In metric that's the difference,
Speaker 1: say between twenty one degrees celsius where you are and
Speaker 1: thirty eight some six up. It doesn't take much of
Speaker 1: an altitude change to make a difference. Because of this
Speaker 1: and a number of other circumstances, the Santa Annas have
Speaker 1: a reputation. These winds most often whip into southern California
Speaker 1: during the driest part of the year, providing a metaphoric
Speaker 1: bit of gasoline to the already fire ready tinder in
Speaker 1: the area. For example, in December of the Santa Anna's
Speaker 1: fueled the largest fire in southern California's history, the Thomas Fire,
Speaker 1: which burned four hundred and forty square miles that's eleven
Speaker 1: thousand square kilometers Inventor and Santa Barbara Counties. The winds
Speaker 1: also fanned the flames of the October two thousand seven
Speaker 1: and two thousand three wildfires, and all of these have
Speaker 1: caused serious damage to property and the people in wild
Speaker 1: life that lived there from the fires themselves, but also
Speaker 1: from smoke. According to a paper published in the journal
Speaker 1: Geophysical Research Letters in the frequency of Santa ana wind
Speaker 1: events is actually decreasing and may drop by an average
Speaker 1: of eighteen percent by the end of the twenty first century.
Speaker 1: This is largely because the Great Basin will have fewer
Speaker 1: days of the cold weather that's necessary to form the winds.
Speaker 1: Though that may sound like good news, it's not. The
Speaker 1: Santa Anna's will still have a busy period as they
Speaker 1: do now, and it will come in the peak of
Speaker 1: a later possibly longer wildfire season. That peak will shift
Speaker 1: from October into November and the early winter months, which
Speaker 1: could lead to bigger wildfires that burn longer. As a
Speaker 1: weather phenomenon that's unique to southern California, the Santa Anna's
Speaker 1: have long been associated with a certain feel. Novelist Raymond Chandler,
Speaker 1: a long time so Cal resident famed for detective stories
Speaker 1: like The Big Sleep, described a windy Santa Anna knight
Speaker 1: in his short story Red Wind. Quote. On nights like that,
Speaker 1: every booze party ends in a fight. Meek little wives
Speaker 1: feel the edge of the carving knife and study their
Speaker 1: husband's necks. Anything can happen. You can even get a
Speaker 1: full glass of beer at a cocktail lounge. On the
Speaker 1: other hand, Santa Anna's can sweep out impurities in the air,
Speaker 1: provide welcome warmth, and offer bright blue skies and stunning
Speaker 1: sunsets in the winter. The Beach Boys took this more
Speaker 1: upbeat look at the winds and their song Santa Ana Winds,
Speaker 1: fill my sails a desert wind and hold the waves
Speaker 1: high for me. Then I will come and test my
Speaker 1: skill where the Santa Ana winds blow free. Still, too
Speaker 1: many residents in the area the Santa Annas have an
Speaker 1: ominous feel to them. Essayist Joan Didion wrote in her
Speaker 1: essay The Santa Anna's, published as part of Los Angeles
Speaker 1: Notebook and Slouching towards Bethlehem in I have neither heard
Speaker 1: nor read that a Santa Anna is due, but I
Speaker 1: know it, and almost everyone I've seen today knows it too.
Speaker 1: We know it because we feel it. The baby frets,
Speaker 1: the maide sulks, I rekindle a waning argument with the
Speaker 1: telephone company, then cut my losses and lie down, given
Speaker 1: over to whatever it is in the air. To live
Speaker 1: with the Santa Anna is to accept, consciously or unconsciously,
Speaker 1: a deeply mechanistic view of human behavior. Whatever lies in
Speaker 1: store for the Santa Annas and all they reap is
Speaker 1: still a matter for the future. But for now, the warm,
Speaker 1: dry i winds continue to blow the citizens of southern California.
Speaker 1: You can feel it. Today's episode is based on the
Speaker 1: article what are the sent to Anna Winds? On House
Speaker 1: to forwarks dot com, written by John Donovan. Brainstuff is
Speaker 1: production of by Heart Radio in partnership with how s
Speaker 1: toff works dot Com, and it's produced by Tyler playing
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