Thunderstorms Roll Through Parts Of Bay Area And California's Central Valley, Spark Fires

CBS Bay Area

September 3, 2025

Thunderstorms rolled through parts of the San Francisco Bay Area and California's Central Valley early Tuesday morning, leading to thousands of lightning strikes and sparking several fires.

According to the San Francisco Bay Area bureau of the National Weather Service, nearly 4,800 total lightning strikes were reported in the region between midnight and 5:30 a.m., which includes in-cloud and cloud-to-ground lightning. The storm brought very little rain, with most areas only seeing .1 inch or less.

"Dry" thunderstorms rolled through the Central Valley and portions of the East Bay this morning. Most areas saw less than 0.10" inches of rain & there were a few fire starts. Here's an image showing ~5,000 lightning strikes (cloud to ground and in-cloud) through 530am. #CAwx pic.twitter.com/uvtzRsaxez
— NWS Bay Area 🌉 (@NWSBayArea) September 2, 2025

A map provided by the weather service shows the lightning was concentrated in the inland East Bay and a wide swath of the Central Valley from Sacramento southward.

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