As Californians break out umbrellas for a rainy holiday, specialized crews are gearing up to fly their planes directly into the winter’s incoming atmospheric rivers. … This winter, leading climate institutions including UC San Diego’s Scripps Institution of Oceanography are ramping up a research program that uses the planes to monitor atmospheric rivers — the ribbons of water vapor in the sky that can drop up to half of California’s annual precipitation. A goal of the effort, announced Tuesday, is to improve forecasts from the current one-week advanced storm warnings to more like two weeks. … For California, improved forecasts not only offer residents more time to plan for rain and snow, but the warning can also make a big difference for reservoir management in the state.

Other reservoir management news:

• Active NorCal (Redding, Calif.): Shasta Lake rises more than a foot in just hours as heavy rain pounds Northern California
• California Department of Water Resources: News release: Lake Oroville update