Well now that our weather is back to ‘normal,’ we can inject some other items of interest worth sharing. The folks along the central Washington Coast at Hoquiam have been chatting about the very unusual dry spell the first two weeks of this month. Outside of a few snow flurries and sprinkles, not much made it into the rain bucket (of course that will change drastically this week). This falls on the heels of their second-wettest November, when 18.53 inches were recorded. The wettest was 21.17 inches in 2006. Nearby Ocean Shoes measured 21.3 inches in November.
Portland set record lows last week four days in a row. Beginning with 14 degrees on Dec. 8, 12 degrees on Dec. 9, 13 degrees on Dec. 10 and 14 degrees on Dec. 11. I guess that cold snap was one for the record books.
Whistler-Blackcomb, north of Vancouver, B.C., set a new monthly snowfall record in November with 220.47 inches (more than 18 feet). That is almost four times the average in their 30 years of keeping records. Our mountains got off to a good start, although with much lighter snow depths. It has been a dry run up on the mountain, so new snow this week will be quite welcome. Snow levels will be rising all week and the lower ski areas could get a dose of plain old rain. Next week looks better for cold and snow in the mountains.
El Niño is still forecast to strengthen a bit and we could see more of split-flow pattern beginning in January. If so, we may expect drier conditions similar to the past two weeks, most likely without the arctic air.
Pat Timm is a local weather specialist. His column appears Tuesdays, Thursdays and Sundays. Reach him at weathersystems.com.
