Tropical Storm Karina formed in the Pacific Ocean on Thursday afternoon with 45 mph sustained winds and could turn toward Southern California as a hurricane.
The National Hurricane Center expects the newly developed tropical cyclone to reach hurricane strength by Friday night. The agency confirmed that Karina was officially designated as a tropical storm on August 27, 2026, accompanied by active thunderstorm clusters and sustained wind speeds exceeding 45 mph.
Karina is currently situated roughly 1,500 miles south of San Diego, a major coastal city in Southern California. Weather officials anticipate the storm will retain hurricane intensity through at least next Tuesday. Forecasters have not yet determined whether the cyclone will escalate into a major hurricane, which requires Category 3 status with sustained wind speeds reaching 111 mph or higher.
Although initial projections indicated Karina would remain well offshore along the western coastline of Mexico, recent computer guidance suggests a dramatic shift. Updated meteorological models warn that the storm could turn north and east toward the United States West Coast over the coming days.
The storm already features an expansive wind field extending outward more than 200 miles from its center. High ocean swells and dangerous rip currents, powerful channels of fast-moving water flowing away from shore, are expected to begin affecting the Baja California Peninsula and southwestern Mexico this weekend.
Forecast models track potential landfall
Computer guidance systems known as spaghetti models display several potential trajectories that bring the storm directly ashore in Southern California. Spaghetti models plot multiple forecast runs from different computer systems to illustrate potential paths for tropical cyclones. These modeling tracks show Karina moving east and making a direct landfall somewhere along the coastal corridor between San Diego and Los Angeles.
Specific runs from the American Global Forecast System, commonly known as the GFS model, show at least six different pathways where Karina barrels through the Pacific before slamming into the California coast. The GFS is a numerical weather prediction model operated by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration that simulates atmospheric conditions worldwide.
However, atmospheric modeling centers remain split on the storm's ultimate destination. The European model, also known as the EPS Ensemble system, currently shows Karina staying far off the California coast and moving harmlessly out to sea. The EPS is a global forecasting framework operated by European meteorologists that evaluates multiple atmospheric scenarios.
Meteorologists stress that forecast models carry high uncertainty when predicting storm positions several days in advance. Forecast tracks can shift dramatically once tropical cyclones form and get closer to making landfall, as predictive confidence decreases the farther into the future a model attempts to forecast.
Historical rarity of California storms
A direct hit from an ocean cyclone moving straight into Southern California would represent an extraordinary meteorological event. A tropical storm taking such a path, originating from the ocean and driving directly into Southern California, has not occurred in nearly a century, since the Long Beach Tropical Storm struck in 1939.
According to official records maintained by the National Weather Service, the federal agency responsible for tracking atmospheric conditions across the nation, California has never experienced a hurricane making landfall in recorded history.
The last time the state was struck by a tropical storm was in 1997, when a weakening Hurricane Nora crossed into the United States from Mexico while still maintaining tropical storm strength.
More recently, Hurricane Hilary impacted Southern California three years ago in August 2023. Weather officials later determined that Hilary was no longer a named cyclone by the time it made landfall near Cathedral City, California, a city in Riverside County, after striking on August 21, 2023.
Atmospheric barriers protecting the coast
Tropical storms and hurricanes form regularly in the eastern Pacific Ocean every summer, but oceanographic and atmospheric mechanisms almost always prevent these cyclones from approaching the West Coast of the United States.
Tropical cyclones require sea surface temperatures to reach 80 degrees Fahrenheit or higher to maintain their internal strength and thermodynamic structure. However, the California Current, a cold ocean current flowing southward along the West Coast, brings much colder water close to the shore, preventing major storms from maintaining hurricane intensity near land.
In addition, storms are blocked from reaching California by prevailing northeast trade winds. These persistent atmospheric trade winds steer eastern Pacific weather systems westward toward Hawaii or over open ocean waters. As a result, California is far more often affected by the dying remnants of major Pacific storms, which fade into rainstorms by the time they reach land.
Super El Niño drives ocean temperatures
Weather patterns in 2026 may be significantly altered due to the formation of a Super El Niño in the Pacific Ocean. El Niño is a natural climate phenomenon characterized by ocean surface temperatures in the Pacific becoming noticeably warmer than historical averages, altering atmospheric circulation and global weather patterns.
A Super El Niño classification means that ocean surface temperatures have risen by more than 3.6 degrees Fahrenheit, or 2.0 degrees Celsius, above normal historical baselines. Meteorologists at AccuWeather have predicted that the 2026 El Niño will likely be the strongest in recorded history, with sea surface temperatures in the Pacific rising by up to 4.8 degrees Fahrenheit, or 2.66 degrees Celsius.
Paul Pastelok, lead long-range forecaster at AccuWeather, previously stated that both California and Arizona must prepare for an unusually wet year, particularly during the Pacific hurricane season, which does not end until November 30.
Pastelok noted in June that the Super El Niño in the Pacific could bring a historic tropical storm or hurricane to California. Pastelok warned: "There could be some insane flooding that could take place, not only just in the summer, but it could even be out of season as well into the wintertime."
Explaining the complex weather interaction, Pastelok added: "You gotta watch the combination of the monsoon and marine heatwave. A marine heatwave that's near the Baja, with El Niño combined, you've got three things working to possibly produce some unusual type of wet weather in Southern California, Phoenix, Tucson, in that area there."
