RECORD SETTER: With the smog season officially...

RECORD SETTER: With the smog season officially over in a week, it looks like 1993 will be the first year since record-keeping began in which Orange County had no smog alerts. . . . What gets the credit? Stricter regulation? More efficient car engines? Yes, but also the weather, says a South Coast Air Quality Management District spokesman. . . . Generally wet, cool weather all year, plus winds spawned by El Nino, the warm Pacific Ocean current, whisked away smog before it could concentrate.

HOW WET WAS IT? There have been wetter years, but not wetter Junes. . . . Normal rainfall for that month is a scant 0.03 of an inch, but this year 1.38 inches fell on Santa Ana, all during freak thunderstorms June 5 and 6. “No one was prepared for that,” said a county flood control official. “It took everyone by surprise.” . . . During 12 months ending Oct. 15, about 24 inches had fallen, far below the record, but nearly twice the norm.

RIDING THE WAVES: On a busy day, thousands call Sean Collins’ office in Huntington Beach for one of the most specialized weather reports available. . . . His Surfline/Wavetrak firm caters to surfers and can tell them whether the waves are up in Miami or when the big swells off Honolulu will arrive. Started in 1984 in Collins’ bedroom, the company now has 100 surf reporters nationwide and uses a computer model designed by an aerospace scientist. Collins now claims better than 90% accuracy for his forecasts.

ODDS MAKERS: The National Weather Service timidly predicts that, through December, there’s a 51% chance of below-normal rainfall and a 55% chance of above-normal temperatures in the county--hardly better than a coin toss. . . . Old-time folk forecasters were more confident. According to the Orange County Almanac, local Indians in 1883, noticing that gophers were migrating to high ground, issued a warning that an epic deluge was due within the week. Sure enough, not only was the week bone-dry, but the year went down as the second driest on record.

Clearing the Air

The numbers of first- and second-stage smog alerts in Orange County, called when ozone reaches dangerous levels in the air, have been steadily decreasing. 1978: 67 1983: 39 1988: 9 1993: 0 Source: South Coast Air Quality Management District