A faulty radar in the Santa Cruz Mountains may be to blame for weather apps not working right over the weekend.
The National Weather Service said its large radar high atop Mount Umunhum is down and is working to get a replacement part to fix it before incoming rain expected this week.
"It allows us to see the structure of the storm, what’s actually happening, how fast the winds are in there, and if there’s any hail or snow," said Dylan Flynn, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service. "It really gives us that 3D picture of the storm that we’re a little bit handicapped when we don’t have."
Flynn said the radar is critical for information needed to send alerts to your phone, like a warning of flooding or thunderstorms.
Some weather apps may have not shown any rain over the weekend since the radar's part went down on Saturday.
"A lot of people noticed, ‘Hey, it’s raining. I looked at my weather app and it doesn’t look like it should be raining.’ So unfortunately, there’s a big hole along the Bay Area coastline when that radar goes down," Flynn said.
But the phone systems are also down at the regional site.
Meteorologists said the recent federal cuts or spending freezes are not to blame for the radar issue or its repair.
Flynn stresses they are not completely in the dark and still have satellite images to track cloud cover.
The NWS hopes to have the part needed to fix the radar by Monday or Tuesday. The radar should be scanning again before a new round of rain is expected to start falling in the region on Wednesday.
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"There are some stronger bands of rain coming, especially for areas south of San Jose Wednesday, so we’re hopeful to have the radar up and running before then," Flynn said.
