Weather forecasters offer a “mixed bag’ this week; just reach on in there and pull out a surprise. That may include clouds, sun, showers, hail, thunder and, let’s see, yeah, snow down to the foothills as well. Sound familiar? Yes, it is the same old story — and outside of a dry day or two, I believe the rest of April will behave the same.
Snow showers continued in the mountains Monday and there were even scattered ice pellet showers in the Clark County area. The sun felt good when it was out, but the breeze was chilly and afternoon highs were still below the average of about 60 degrees. I think we will be hard-pressed to top that 60 degree mark this week.
Weather observer Tyler Mode sent me an email with an interesting note about the weather for this Wednesday, April 13. His weather station in the Minnehaha area hasn’t had a high temperature above 65 degrees on that day in his 15 years of records. The highest he has recorded was 65 degrees in 2008. In contrast, he has seen 80 degrees on April 12, 2008, and 78 degrees on April 14, 1996. Well, maybe it is the unlucky 13, eh? It was hot on that day in 1926, with an 88 degree high here in Vancouver. He adds that the 65 degree high is his lowest record high for all of April, at least in his 15 years of records.
This is my birthday week and I have seen many extremes, even measurable snowfall here in the city on my birthday. Granted it was early morning and mainly covered the bark dust and grassy areas but nevertheless that’s crazy. But hey, the weather is crazy at times and, of course, our averages and normals are just a collection of extremes.
