“The way this winter has started, how dry it is, it could extend our fire season to next year,” said Joe Sirard, a National Weather Service meteorologist in Oxnard. If the rains don’t come and the winds do, he said, “that will keep us in high fire season.”

Two recent stretches of dangerous Santa Ana winds played out exactly the way forecasters worried they would, fueling the flames of major fires across coastal Southern California. Just this week, a fire that sparked near Malibu amid the high winds destroyed at least seven homes and scorched more than 4,000 acres. In early November, an even more devastating wildfire charged across southern Ventura County, fanned by hurricane-force winds, exploding to nearly 20,000 acres, destroying more than 180 structures and damaging many more.

Downtown Los Angeles has recorded only 0.14 inches of rain from May 6 to Dec. 11 — the third driest such stretch since 1877, Sirard said. Although there’s a slight chance of rain this week, it’s not expected to amount to much if it does materialize.