The weather in San Diego is so bad it prompted the local National Weather Service office to write a poem. And that poem gave birth to a word that may not be very familiar to many in the usually sunny region – Greypril.
A haiku posted during National Poetry Month provides the first and most important clue to its meaning: “Oh sun, where are you? Graypril, May gray, June gloom… Ugh gray cloud, go away (please),” NWS San Diego said. tweeted during the week.
For #InternationalHaiku Poetry Day, we humbly present to you a haiku
Oh sun, where are you?
Greypril, May Grey, June Gloom… Ugh
Gray cloud, go away (please)#CAwx
— NWS San Diego (@NWSSanDiego) April 17, 2023
Normally sunny San Diego is experiencing a week of lots of clouds — and sea conditions could be even higher.
On Monday, before the weather service tweeted its haiku, the office issued a forecast saying San Diego would see fog and drizzle, along with “multiple low cloud levels” combined with a coastal eddy to limit sunlight. High temperatures in the area were also “below normal”.
“Temperatures will remain quite cold for the next few days,” the agency said at a weekly weather briefing on Monday. “In fact, elevations are typically 5-10 degrees lower across the plains, with an average of 15 degrees lower in the mountains.”
NWS meteorologist Dan Gregoria told CBS San Diego that “greypril” is “an introduction to May Grey.”
“I think we’re going to see more of that this year because seawater sea surface temperatures are near record cold levels and it’s getting grayer for us,” he said, adding that conditions could make May and June darker than normal.
“That’s usually our peak in cloud cover which is the sea level deck near the coast and I think we’re going to see a lot of that in May and even into June,” he said.
But much of the current “dry” weather will pass by Thursday, the agency said, “as skies clear and winds move offshore briefly.” At that time, elevations will return to normal, and in some cases, slightly higher, and “there will be plenty of sunshine.”
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Lee Cohen
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