Hope you’re enjoying the ice, and some snow at high elevations of Clark County, because they’ll stay with us today, with the forecast calling for a low of 15 degrees this morning in Vancouver.
We may peek above freezing this afternoon, with a high forecast in the low 30s, but we’ll stay dry, Miles Higa, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service in Portland, said Tuesday night.
Looking at Thanksgiving Day, Higa expects a low in the upper 20s Thursday morning, warming to a high in the low 40s. Beginning as soon as Thursday afternoon, there’s a chance of rain that’s more likely Thursday night.
“The cold air is losing its grip,” Higa said.
Higa thinks the coming rains will quickly melt the ice, with no freezing rain expected in Clark County, though it’s possible in the Columbia River Gorge.
The cold arctic air that slipped south and froze Clark County on Monday night shouldn’t be called an arctic blast, Higa said, because it wasn’t coupled with howling icy winds coming out of the Gorge.
But, “It was very quick transition,” he said.
It led to a low of 22 degrees Tuesday morning at Pearson Field, and an afternoon high of 29, Higa said.
Well-prepared public works and emergency crews throughout the county woke early Tuesday to find a thin layer of ice on freeways and roads, particularly side streets, but little snow other than the tree-top dotting, picture-enhancing variety.
As of 8:40 p.m. Tuesday, a 911 dispatcher reported very few accidents in Clark County, including up north in hilly terrain.
Trooper Ryan Tanner said he was aware of only one minor accident, about 6:25 p.m. Tuesday, when a vehicle slid off state Highway 503 near Fargher Lake. No one was reported injured.
A WSP dispatcher said she, too, was aware of only that one accident.
‘Absolutely beautiful’
The metro area mostly escaped the heavy snowfall dumped on other parts of Washington.
Monday evening marked a familiar experience for snow-lovers, said Andy Bryant, a hydrologist with the National Weather Service in Portland: Anticipation meets letdown.
“We didn’t get the cold air in here fast enough to mix with our precipitation,” Bryant said. “It’s really hard to get the moisture and the cold air together at the same time. Typically, the cold air that we get is dry.”
Snow that fell Monday night stuck around Tuesday in the high areas of Clark County.
Sheila Stuhlsatz, who lives outside La Center on Northeast 21st Avenue, said there was about four inches with an icy cover on her family’s property.
“The roads are clear but icy because the snow plow has been through,” Stuhlsatz said at 7:30 p.m. Tuesday.
In Yacolt, Diana Requa said she lives at about 600 feet elevation and reported less than an inch of snow — with an icy crust she compared to crystal.
“It’s absolutely beautiful,” said Requa, who’s involved in the Lion’s Club and Amboy Territorial Days. “The evergreen trees are covered with snow.” She said a friend who lives in the Dole Valley area, at 1,250 feet, has as much as a foot of snow.
A forecast that possessed bark but lacked bite, except for the ice, was a welcome revelation for emergency personnel who expected worse. “I think we’ve escaped, at least so far,” said Jim Flaherty, a Vancouver Fire Department spokesman.
Vancouver Fire Capt. Chris Moen said Tuesday night that few weather-related crashes had occurred. He said firefighters checked out a couple of people who fell on the ice, but they weren’t seriously injured.
Flaherty said early Tuesday afternoon “fall calls” were picking up. And with ice likely to stick around through at least the early afternoon, his call for thought-out footsteps remains active.
Many area schools either started late or closed altogether Tuesday, the threat of a storm sufficient to satisfy schoolchildren’s dreams of a snow day — minus the snow.
Margaret Varkados likely wished her school had canceled classes. A Columbian photographer captured the Fircrest Elementary School principal struggling to get inside her car Tuesday morning outside her Lincoln neighborhood home. The reason: her driver’s side door had frozen shut.
Thanks to Vancouver and Clark County public works crews, salt-brine made roads largely passable for Varkados — once she got going — and other drivers.
Untreated, though, were the driveways, parking lots and sidewalks tread on, not by tires, but rubber soles.
The fire department seized the opening provided by the cold front to issue standard, yearly warnings: 1. If you have frozen pipes, call a plumber. 2. Create a three-foot buffer around space heaters, clearing away curtains and other combustibles.
“Don’t get in there with heating devices or torches,” Flaherty said of do-it-yourself pipe-thawing strategies.
For holiday travelers, the Washington Department of Transportation said snow and ice remains on Puget Sound highways and mountain passes throughout the state. Heavy winds are complicating driving conditions in Eastern Washington.
Drivers are encouraged to leave early, slow down, allow extra space between vehicles and keep gas tanks full.
