La Jolla conditions
La Jolla visibility today: the storm got smaller
Yesterday the model had an inch of rain coming. Today it has a quarter inch. Thursday stays a B.
La Jolla visibility today, Thursday, Oct. 22: the Dive Pro beta model says B. That's 15 to 24 feet, medium confidence. The model puts about three in four on the B, a little under one in four on a C, and a D as the long shot. Fourth B in a row.
The bigger news is what it took back. Yesterday's run had about 1.1 inches of rain landing today and dropped Friday to a D, 5 to 9 feet. This morning's run has no rain today and about a quarter inch Friday. Friday is now a C, 10 to 14 feet. The storm went from a washout to a drizzle, at least on paper. Weather forecasts move. This one moved our way.
Why rain matters at all: it rinses streets, canyons and storm drains into the ocean. That's the brown water you see hugging the beach after a storm, and it carries bacteria. San Diego County's standing advice is to stay out of the ocean for 72 hours after rain. A quarter inch is not nothing. It's just a lot less than an inch.
The swell got a little busier. The main one is about 2.8 feet at roughly 11 and a half seconds out of the south-southwest. A second, smaller one, about 1.6 feet at 9 seconds, is coming from the west-northwest. Two swells from two directions means the water gets shoved around from more than one side, and the sand in the shallows doesn't settle as much. The model's surf number tops out around 4.5 feet, up from about 3.6 yesterday. Deeper entries will hold up better than the sand.
Wind is not the story today. The model has it around 10 to 11 miles an hour most of the day, gusts near 17. A steady bump on the surface, not a whitecap afternoon.
The tide gives you the window. In the model's tide numbers, there's a high of about 4.8 feet around 7:30 a.m., falling to a low near 1.4 feet at 1:33 p.m. The model counts the falling tide as a small negative, because outgoing water is less likely to pull cleaner offshore water toward the beach. So the best shot is early, close to the high.
On bacteria, nothing new at La Jolla. As of Wednesday morning's County beach list, La Jolla Cove has been under an advisory since Sept. 29, and Children's Pool has its usual long-running one. The La Jolla Shores stations and WindanSea were not on the list.
Water is still warm. The nearshore buoy off Scripps read 72.7 degrees.
The Scripps Pier camera's latest frame is from Wednesday evening. It shoots around midday and late afternoon, so a morning picture from yesterday is normal. The automatic camera grade didn't post, so today's number is the model on its own.
The play: go this morning, near the high. Friday looks a lot better than it did 24 hours ago, but it's still a step down from today. Odds, not a lock.
The usual reminder. This model is beta. It hasn't been checked against a full season of real dive reports yet. Treat it like a buddy's read in the parking lot, not a promise. Daily numbers live on the La Jolla forecast.
Dive spots: La Jolla visibility, Monterey Breakwater, McAbee Beach, Lovers Point, Point Lobos, Monastery Beach, Catalina Wrigley, and Anacapa.
Sources: Dive Pro La Jolla beta forecast, published 22 October 2026 for forecast dates 22 to 23 October 2026 (model_outputs/latest_forecast.json and forecast_10day.json), compared with the 21 October 2026 run. NDBC station 46254 (Scripps nearshore) water temperature via the Dive Pro forecast feed. San Diego County Department of Environmental Health and Quality beach and bay water quality, checked 21 October 2026. Scripps Pier camera.