We had a little excitement over the long holiday weekend with a good show of thunderstorms, mainly south of the Columbia River. In southern and western areas of the greater Portland area rainfall amounts varied from a quarter-inch to over 1 inch including marble-size hail. Locally, only sprinkles reached the gauge in Vancouver totaling .02 of an inch. Hardly noticeable.
Most of the thunder activity was over around midnight from my vantage point in the Salmon Creek area but may have lingered after I went to bed. No such thunderstorms, nocturnal or otherwise, are in the extended forecast.
The forecast includes mostly sunny weather with seasonal highs in the 70s. We keep the hot stuff at bay this week. Our average high temperature this week is around 78 degrees. The persistent cloud cover of Monday kept us from reaching 70 degrees as of 5 p.m. Meanwhile at the coast it was mostly sunny with blue skies and afternoon temperatures pushing 70 degrees.
You’ll remember the outlook for the first week or 10 days of September was forecast to have cooler-than-average temperatures. Now I see the national acclimate outlook has above normal-highs pushing to 90 degrees or better and no rain at all Sept. 12-20. Plenty of summerlike weather ahead, it appears. Fall officially begins locally on Sept. 22 at 11:50 p.m.
After that date our high temperatures really begin to lower, and plants and trees slow down their growth. I think I begin to slow down about that time of the year as well. Autumn is my favorite time of the year. The giant weather machine begins to fire up and unexpected weather can become a reality. Bluster winds, driving rains and cold crisp nights. And as usual I begin looking at the first frost.
The recent rains we had late last week that brought over one-half inch here in Vancouver, gave Mount Rainier a mantle of white at the 10,000-foot elevation. Yep, it’s coming before long folks. Colder days, fires in the fireplace and scary pumpkins on the front porch.
Take good care and I’ll see you Thursday!
