Hurricane Rachel's Path Now Reaches Southern California, With Rain by Sunday

The weakening storm's leftovers could drop half an inch to 2 inches of rain through Tuesday, most in the mountains, forecasters say.

Wednesday, Hurricane Rachel was out over the open eastern Pacific, west of Baja California's southern tip, crawling west-northwest, away from land.

The forecast says it won't stay on that heading. The National Hurricane Center expects Rachel to slow down and then hook sharply northeast by the end of the week, and the center's forecast cone now stretches into Southern California, KTLA reported. Forecasters don't expect a hurricane to arrive. They expect what's left of one, carrying rain and wind from Saturday night into Tuesday.

The hurricane center's 8 a.m. advisory listed no coastal watches or warnings and no hazards to land. Rachel's top winds were near 80 mph, Category 1 strength, and steady weakening is in the forecast. AccuWeather says the storm has likely peaked and may not hold on as an official hurricane center system once it reaches the cooler water off northwest Mexico.

That's the catch with the cone. It shows where the storm's center could travel, not where the rain or the damage will fall. AccuWeather points to Hurricane Hilary in 2023, which the hurricane center downgraded to post-tropical before its center ever reached the U.S. Its heavy rain kept coming anyway, and the flooding dragged on for days.

In a Wednesday statement reported by MyNewsLA, the National Weather Service said a low-pressure system would soak up Rachel's leftover moisture and push it northeast into the far south of the state and northern Baja. Showers are expected Sunday through Tuesday, with the best odds Sunday night into Monday. Totals could run from about half an inch to 2 inches, the most in the mountains.

MyNewsLA reported that the hurricane center's track put landfall near Ensenada, with effects reaching San Diego and Mexicali starting Saturday night.

Wind comes with it. The weather service expects gusts of 20 to 30 mph from the coast to the valleys, and 35 to 45 mph in the mountains and deserts. Below the San Gorgonio Pass in the northern Coachella Valley, gusts could reach 55 to 65 mph. By the end of the weekend, forecasters expected some places to land under flash flood watches or warnings, plus wind watches, MyNewsLA reported.

For Los Angeles, the worst soaking may land next door. AccuWeather expects the heaviest rain to fall just east of both San Diego and L.A., with the deserts taking a drenching. It warned of flash flooding and mudslides in canyons and especially on recent burn scars.

The beaches get Rachel first. AccuWeather says big swells will keep reaching Southern California into the weekend. The waves won't be as strong as the ones from this season's bigger storms, but Rachel's closer path makes up some of the difference.

First the heat has to break. Riverside was forecast to top out just above 100 degrees Thursday, and the weather service expects more normal temperatures starting Saturday, right ahead of the storm. That's triple digits to flash flood watches in about four days.

AccuWeather counts just one official tropical storm landfall in Southern California, in 1939. Rachel could cross the state line late in the weekend as a tropical depression or simply a rainstorm, it says, which wouldn't count. The rain won't need the title.

Source: nhc.noaa.gov, retrieved October 8, 2026. Other sources: accuweather.com, mynewsla.com.