Santa Monica to Jacksonville: the road a strong El Niño soaks.
Interstate 10 runs 2,460 miles along the southern edge of the country, and in a strong El Niño winter the storms run with it. This strip lays the county history along the road, milepost by milepost: the 2026–27 odds, what each of the nine strong El Niño winters since 1957 actually delivered, the drought debt the rain would have to repay, and how much skill that history has shown in each county.
The strip
Miles from Santa Monica2,460 miles, county by county
Each column is a county the road crosses, as wide as the miles I-10 spends in it. Hover or tap anywhere on the strip to read a county; select one to pin it below. On a phone the strip scrolls sideways inside its frame.
Select a county on the strip or the map to read it here.
The corridor on the map
Counties the road crosses2026–27 chance of a wet winter (Dec–Feb in the wettest third)
History layer: the trend plus the nine strong El Niño winters. Grey counties are off the corridor; every county is on Your county.
Why this road
The subtropical jet stream is a river of fast wind high over the southern states; in a strong El Niño the warm tropical Pacific feeds it and pushes it south and east, so it runs from California across the Gulf Coast to Florida. Storms ride that jet one after another, which is why the winters along I-10 are the ones El Niño turns wet most reliably, and why the northern tier often runs mild and dry at the same time.