Here’s Chance to Wear Raincoat--or Overcoat

Sunday’s scattered showers and unusually chilly temperatures will continue as an unusual jet stream moves south from Canada to California, meteorologists said.

Sporadic showers will last until Tuesday, when dry weather is expected to return to Orange County. However, more rain is expected Wednesday and Thursday, said meteorologist Robb Kaczmarek of WeatherData Inc., which provides weather information for The Times.

“The showers don’t look to be impressively heavy,” Kaczmarek said. “But they will keep it damp. It will also be unseasonably cold basically all week.”

The cool temperatures Sunday resulted in hail showers in Fullerton, Huntington Beach, Irvine, Lake Forest, Mission Viejo and San Clemente.

Temperatures will hover in the low to middle 50s today and rise only slightly Tuesday. The average high temperatures for this time of year are in the upper 60s, Kaczmarek said.

For much of Southern California the cold snap left high temperatures at about the normal for lows and pushed overnight temperatures in some inland areas below freezing. The same was true in the San Francisco Bay Area, where motorists had to scrape ice off their windshields Sunday morning.

Less than half an inch of rain fell in Santa Ana from late Saturday afternoon to late Sunday afternoon, Kaczmarek said. Since last July 1, Orange County has had about 7 inches of rain--nearly 2 inches less than average for the period.

Sunday’s slick road conditions contributed to several car accidents across the county, according to the California Highway Patrol.

One of the worst accidents occurred just before 10 a.m. on Interstate 5 just south of Avery Parkway in San Juan Capistrano.

A Honda heading south on Interstate 5 veered into the northbound side of the freeway during heavy rain, crashing into a white car that was subsequently rear-ended by another vehicle, CHP Officer Greg Saulman said.

The white car’s driver suffered a broken ankle and had to be pulled from his vehicle with the aid of a hydraulic prying device, Saulman said. He was taken first to Samaritan Medical Center in San Clemente and then to Mission Hospital Regional Medical Center in Mission Viejo, where a hospital spokeswoman said he was in serious condition Sunday evening.

About 30 seconds after the crash, drivers in a black car and a green Jeep stopped their cars to avoid the accident. A white pickup truck struck the Jeep, which then slammed into the black vehicle, Saulman said. The driver of the white pickup was arrested at the scene for driving under the influence, Saulman said.

The two left lanes of north Interstate 5 were closed for about an hour while crews cleaned up debris. Names of those involved in the crashes were not available.

In other weather-related incidents, rain forced the cancellation of a bicycle and skateboard show planned by Huntington Beach’s International Surf Museum, Police Lt. Jim Cutshaw said.

“The rain washed out the only event we had going” Sunday, Cutshaw said. “It kind of got ruined.”

Times staff writer Len Hall contributed to this report.