May Winter Continue 2022 PNW

[jakerepp]

Hi everyone!

[SilverFallsAndrew]

2 minutes ago, jakerepp said:

Hi everyone!

I was reading something about the growth in Maricopa County the other day and wondered if you had moved down there yet.

[Requiem]

2 hours ago, BLI snowman said:

PDX's total in January 1980 seemed pretty low. From what I know, most of eastern Portland into Gresham had around 2 feet in that snowstorm, so PDX being at half that is a bit odd. And Clark County generally had 2-3 feet outside of downtown Vancouver.

There was a ton of freezing rain with that in southern/western Portland and Washington County. I would imagine your area was mostly ZR with a fair amount of snow on the first day and last day of that storm. It was pretty much a juicier version of February 2021.

Also of note if I recall correctly were the 75-90(!) inch totals in places like Hood River over the course of the storm. In fact I believe 49 inches at Hood River on the 8-9 is still Oregon's 24 hour snowfall record.

[GobBluth]

Mid 70s seem difficult with this overcast.

[TT-SEA]

Sun coming out here... already 63 in North Bend. 

[Doinko]

2 hours ago, BLI snowman said:

PDX's total in January 1980 seemed pretty low. From what I know, most of eastern Portland into Gresham had around 2 feet in that snowstorm, so PDX being at half that is a bit odd. And Clark County generally had 2-3 feet outside of downtown Vancouver.

There was a ton of freezing rain with that in southern/western Portland and Washington County. I would imagine your area was mostly ZR with a fair amount of snow on the first day and last day of that storm. It was pretty much a juicier version of February 2021.

I had about 4.5 inches in Feb 2021 and a lot of sleet, maybe I could've managed 9 or so inches. I wonder if my area can get those precip totals while staying on the pure snow side. I think the model runs were showing heavy snow in my area for Feb 2021 but it shifted slightly north. 

[jakerepp]

28 minutes ago, SilverFallsAndrew said:

I was reading something about the growth in Maricopa County the other day and wondered if you had moved down there yet.

Yeah, so we have actually signed a purchase agreement/contract with a builder down there and are going through getting loan estimates from their preferred lenders, plus the lender we had talked to already.

I'm flying down on the 7th to go to the design center to finish off our customization.

The earliest we would be down there is November.

[SilverFallsAndrew]

10 minutes ago, jakerepp said:

Yeah, so we have actually signed a purchase agreement/contract with a builder down there and are going through getting loan estimates from their preferred lenders, plus the lender we had talked to already.

I'm flying down on the 7th to go to the design center to finish off our customization.

The earliest we would be down there is November.

Wow. Good for you guys. I could never live where it doesn't snow. 

[Rubus Leucodermis]

5 minutes ago, SilverFallsAndrew said:

Wow. Good for you guys. I could never live where it doesn't snow. 

That, and living somewhere with near-endless triple-digit high temperatures for much of the year is also a big turn-off for me.

[SilverFallsAndrew]

5 minutes ago, Rubus Leucodermis said:

That, and living somewhere with near-endless triple-digit high temperatures for much of the year is also a big turn-off for me.

Yeah, and a giant city. But I do like Arizona. My buddy used to live in Glendale, and it seemed like a nice life. 

[TT-SEA]

Gorgeous now...

[Rubus Leucodermis]

7 minutes ago, SilverFallsAndrew said:

Yeah, and a giant city. But I do like Arizona. My buddy used to live in Glendale, and it seemed like a nice life. 

I don’t mind cities if I don’t have to drive a car in their traffic very much. Between the hot summers, my lack of tolerance for hot weather, and the lack of bicycle-friendliness, I have every reason to think I would hate living in southern Arizona.

[Phishy Wx]

I could do Flagstaff or maybe Sedona or somewhere else on the Rim.  That's about it for AZ, imo 

We actually looked at Flagstaff when we were planning our move from CA in 2017.  Also looked in Santa Fe, Denver, Reno and Bend but ultimately choose Spokane due to low costs at the time.  That's all evaporated in the last 4 years though and getting more expensive as more people move here.

If I had to do it again we probably would've moved to Santa Fe or Taos, but it's a commitment to live in Adobe all the time.

[Kayla]

4 hours ago, TT-SEA said:

I think we are saying the same thing about adaptability.    

But I disagree about length of day.   There is way more sun energy available in Bozeman.    A few more hours of low angle, long shadow sunlight in Fairbanks where the sun hovers the horizon before sunset and after sunrise is probably not making a difference between bare trees and fully leafed out trees.   

I think the trees in Fairbanks have to be more efficient (and leaf out very fast) because the sun angle never gets that high even at its peak in late June.   As you said... this difference probably happens in most years but I never realized it. 

Your theory still doesn’t make any sense. There is more sun energy in Fairbanks during May compared to Bozeman. It’s not until June that Bozeman sees more solar insolation.

[SilverFallsAndrew]

6 minutes ago, Rubus Leucodermis said:

I don’t mind cities if I don’t have to drive a car in their traffic very much. Between the hot summers, my lack of tolerance for hot weather, and the lack of bicycle-friendliness, I have every reason to think I would hate living in southern Arizona.

Prescott isn't bad either. Average 2X as much snow as PDX. 

[Rubus Leucodermis]

6 minutes ago, Phishy Wx said:

I could do Flagstaff or maybe Sedona or somewhere else on the Rim.  That's about it for AZ, imo 

We actually looked at Flagstaff when we were planning our move from CA in 2017.  Also looked in Santa Fe, Denver, Reno and Bend but ultimately choose Spokane due to low costs at the time.  That's all evaporated in the last 4 years though and getting more expensive as more people move here.

If I had to do it again we probably would've moved to Santa Fe or Taos, but it's a commitment to live in Adobe all the time.

The high-elevation parts of the Southwest are definitely the nicest ones in my book. Still sunnier than I prefer (and due to the combination of low latitude and high elevation, the sun is VERY strong; I once got a bad sunburn inside of 10 minutes in June at 7,000 feet elevation in NM.

[Rubus Leucodermis]

6 minutes ago, Kayla said:

Your theory still doesn’t make any sense. There is more sun energy in Fairbanks during May compared to Bozeman. It’s not until June that Bozeman sees more solar insolation.

Wrong, unless you have evidence that discredits the source I linked earlier.

That shows Bozeman getting 5.24 kWh/m²/day on average in May, while Anchorage gets 5.11.

[Kayla]

8 minutes ago, Rubus Leucodermis said:

Wrong, unless you have evidence that discredits the source I linked earlier.

That shows Bozeman getting 5.24 kWh/m²/day on average in May, while Anchorage gets 5.11.

I don’t think trees can tell a 0.13 kWh difference but fair enough.

[TT-SEA]

10 minutes ago, Kayla said:

I don’t think trees can tell a 0.13 kWh difference but fair enough.

A 65 degree sun angle in Bozeman right now should provide way more sun energy than a 46-degree sun angle.   Even if Faribanks has longer low angle sun.    Unless it's much sunnier in Fairbanks.   Which it might be.

[Chewbacca Defense]

1 hour ago, Phil said:

Yeah man, it’s crazy how the body responds to small differences in solar intensity.

I burn quickly down in GA. Even when cloaked in the highest spf sunblock I’ll turn brown after a couple of days. 

On the other hand, was outside in the sun all day at an airshow in Seattle while visiting a few years ago (and then went fishing in Canada), all without sunblock and didn’t even get a tan.

I always had a tricky time as a kid, my grandmother on my dad's side was English, and my dad was a ginger, but on my mom's side, there are stories of some Cherokee getting mixed into the bloodlines in the mid-1800's. 

 

If I was stupid and went charging out into the summer sun all day without sunscreen, I would absolutely fry (like a ginger).  If I was careful and got a good base tan, I would get VERY dark by the end of the summer.  With my high cheekbone structure and dark brown eyes I occasionally had people ask if I was Native American (or at least part). 

 

I wish I didn't have such trust issues with those DNA test companies, because I would love to find out.  My dad's side has only been here a few generations, but my mom's side dates back to pre-Revolutionary war (mostly Scottish/German).

 

On the weather side of things, cloudy morning, and .16" of rain since midnight.

[Phil]

45 minutes ago, Kayla said:

Your theory still doesn’t make any sense. There is more sun energy in Fairbanks during May compared to Bozeman. It’s not until June that Bozeman sees more solar insolation.

I don’t think averaging 24hr insolation is an ideal comparison. The degree to which most trees can actively metabolize is more dependent on having a larger quantity of energy available at a given time, IE: via a steeper solar vector. Power=work/Δt can be loosely applied.

[BLI snowman]

1 hour ago, Doiinko said:

I had about 4.5 inches in Feb 2021 and a lot of sleet, maybe I could've managed 9 or so inches. I wonder if my area can get those precip totals while staying on the pure snow side. I think the model runs were showing heavy snow in my area for Feb 2021 but it shifted slightly north. 

Definitely can. The early 20th century featured a number of storms that dropped widespread 15"+ totals around the northern Willamette Valley. December 9-10, 1919 is probably the grandaddy of those storms. Pretty incredible event with a widespread 20-30" falling in 24 hours from about Corvallis to Castle Rock. It was followed by a week long extremely deep arctic airmass and clear temps, that produced temps as low as -20 in the valley. Basically a heavily roided up version of January 2017.

[SilverFallsAndrew]

22 minutes ago, BLI snowman said:

Definitely can. The early 20th century featured a number of storms that dropped widespread 15"+ totals around the northern Willamette Valley. December 9-10, 1919 is probably the grandaddy of those storms. Pretty incredible event with a widespread 20-30" falling in 24 hours from about Corvallis to Castle Rock. It was followed by a week long extremely deep arctic airmass and clear temps, that produced temps as low as -20 in the valley. Basically a heavily roided up version of January 2017.

What kind of situation caused that event? I always assumed a stalled arctic boundary with a surface low off the coast feeding moisture in. The only other storms I can think of in the ball park would be February 1937 and January 1968 for SW Oregon. But those were more overrunning, and didn't have arctic air in the following days. 

[Rubus Leucodermis]

38 minutes ago, TT-SEA said:

A 65 degree sun angle in Bozeman right now should provide way more sun energy than a 46-degree sun angle.   Even if Faribanks has longer low angle sun.    Unless it's much sunnier in Fairbanks.   Which it might be.

Fairbanks is both warmer and sunnier than Anchorage in the summer. Inland versus coastal climate.

[TT-SEA]

12Z EPS... not bad except for this weekend.    Generally seems like we will be seeing more decently warm days mixed in between troughing.    I assume it will be a slow transition to the usual beautiful summer period from July - Sept which is more common in Nina years.   But if we can get some nice breaks in June then it will be a big improvement over April and May.  

[Phil]

2 minutes ago, TT-SEA said:

12Z EPS... not bad except for this weekend.    Generally seems like we will be seeing more decently warm days mixed in between troughing.    I assume it will be a slow transition to the usual beautiful summer period from July - Sept which is common in Nina years.   But if we can get some nice breaks in June then it will be a big improvement over April and May.  

A lot of noise in there.

[T-Town]

Very crisp views on my post-lunch walk. 66 and mostly sunny here. Beautiful day. 

[jakerepp]

1 hour ago, SilverFallsAndrew said:

Wow. Good for you guys. I could never live where it doesn't snow. 

That was my thought as well, but the chance to own a nice, brand new home in a phenomenal neighborhood was too good to pass on. My hope is that not having any snow is eased by all the snow events that will inevitably fizzle out up here.

[TacomaWaWx]

Euro shows 1.1” of rain through the end of the month…chances of us getting over 4” this month seem to be improving. Could be mistaken but late in the euro run in early June almost has a convective look to it. 

[Doinko]

32 minutes ago, BLI snowman said:

Definitely can. The early 20th century featured a number of storms that dropped widespread 15"+ totals around the northern Willamette Valley. December 9-10, 1919 is probably the grandaddy of those storms. Pretty incredible event with a widespread 20-30" falling in 24 hours from about Corvallis to Castle Rock. It was followed by a week long extremely deep arctic airmass and clear temps, that produced temps as low as -20 in the valley. Basically a heavily roided up version of January 2017.

Some of these historical events are really interesting to look back at. February 2021 was so close to being great for snow in my area, just a few miles south and I would've done well. Also, wasn't the winter of 2006/2007 good up north in the Puget Sound? I think there was some November snow and January snow.

[BLI snowman]

33 minutes ago, SilverFallsAndrew said:

What kind of situation caused that event? I always assumed a stalled arctic boundary with a surface low off the coast feeding moisture in. The only other storms I can think of in the ball park would be February 1937 and January 1968 for SW Oregon. But those were more overrunning, and didn't have arctic air in the following days. 

More or less. You can see that a decently strong (~1005mb) low formed off the SW WA coast and then dropped down into NW OR, ahead of the massive arctic airmass that was beginning to advect in from the ENE. It then continued to cross through OR in a NW to SE track with the arctic air rushing in on the backside of it.

https://library.oarcloud.noaa.gov/docs.lib/htdocs/rescue/dwm/1919/19191209.pdf

https://library.oarcloud.noaa.gov/docs.lib/htdocs/rescue/dwm/1919/19191210.pdf

https://library.oarcloud.noaa.gov/docs.lib/htdocs/rescue/dwm/1919/19191211.pdf

The track was obviously optimal for NW OR/SW WA in particular, but it also seemed to just phase incredibly well with the 500mb arctic trough that was encroaching from the NE. The precip amounts were really astronomical, with places as far inland as Lewiston, ID seeing 0.92" of precip from it. I would imagine that the frontal lifting all along the cold side of the storm was pretty immense and that really amplified the precip amounts.

That arctic boundary really didn't stall out too much, either. The main arctic airmass advected into OR fairly quickly on the 9th-10th and they were seeing very heavy snow in Medford (11") by the morning of the 11th on the backside of the low as it departed.

That storm actually was an overrunning event too, as we already had a pretty solid modified arctic airmass in place in the region on the 8th, with 34/23 in Portland that day, so many places to the south of the initial track seemed to go snow to rain to snow with it.

Edited May 25, 2022 by BLI snowman

[MossMan]

Humid! 

[TT-SEA]

4 minutes ago, MossMan said:

Humid! 

I was just thinking the same thing! 

Happy garden today.  

[Doinko]

14 minutes ago, BLI snowman said:

More or less. You can see that a decently strong (~1005mb) low formed off the SW WA coast and then dropped down into NW OR, ahead of the massive arctic airmass that was beginning to advect in from the ENE. It then continued to cross through OR in a NW to SE track with the arctic air rushing in on the backside of it.

https://library.oarcloud.noaa.gov/docs.lib/htdocs/rescue/dwm/1919/19191209.pdf

https://library.oarcloud.noaa.gov/docs.lib/htdocs/rescue/dwm/1919/19191210.pdf

https://library.oarcloud.noaa.gov/docs.lib/htdocs/rescue/dwm/1919/19191211.pdf

The track was obviously optimal for NW OR/SW WA in particular, but it also seemed to just phase incredibly well with the 500mb arctic trough that was encroaching from the NE. The precip amounts were really astronomical, with places as far inland as Lewiston, ID seeing 0.92" of precip from it. I would imagine that the frontal lifting all along the cold side of the storm was pretty immense and that really amplified the precip amounts.

That arctic boundary really didn't stall out too much, either. The main arctic airmass advected into OR fairly quickly on the 9th-10th and they were seeing very heavy snow in Medford (11") by the morning of the 11th on the backside of the low as it departed.

That storm actually was an overrunning event too, as we already had a pretty solid modified arctic airmass in place in the region on the 8th, with 34/23 in Portland that day, so many places to the south of the initial track seemed to go snow to rain to snow with it.

Which areas were the main target for massive snow amounts with that storm? 

[BLI snowman]

23 minutes ago, Doiinko said:

Some of these historical events are really interesting to look back at. February 2021 was so close to being great for snow in my area, just a few miles south and I would've done well. Also, wasn't the winter of 2006/2007 good up north in the Puget Sound? I think there was some November snow and January snow.

It was. There was a major snowstorm from Everett to Vancouver, BC on 11/26/2006. Then a decent event further south the next day with the arctic front that dropped a couple inches on the Seahawks game during MNF.

January 2007 was more of a regional event and there was widespread snow in WA/OR on the 10th with a rather weak arctic front and then an overrunning clipper on the 16th that overachieved for the Portland metro.

 

[Doinko]

4 minutes ago, BLI snowman said:

It was. There was a major snowstorm from Everett to Vancouver, BC on 11/26/2006. Then a decent event further south the next day with the arctic front that dropped a couple inches on the Seahawks game during MNF.

January 2007 was more of a regional event and there was widespread snow in WA/OR on the 10th with a rather weak arctic front and then an overrunning clipper on the 16th that overachieved for the Portland metro.

 

I think Portland is due for a snowy November at some point, the last one with more than an inch was 1985 here. November 2010 was cold though.

[TT-SEA]

66 at SEA... 70 in North Bend.    

A drizzly, dark early morning has turned into a spectacular day with lots of blue sky and a few puffy clouds.

[BLI snowman]

10 minutes ago, Doiinko said:

Which areas were the main target for massive snow amounts with that storm? 

Basically everyone in NW OR and SW WA. It was more of an East Coast style blizzard in how widespread the mega amounts were. I don't think anyone had less than 17-18".

[BLI snowman]

Turning into a pretty cloudy week here.

[SilverFallsAndrew]

1 hour ago, jakerepp said:

That was my thought as well, but the chance to own a nice, brand new home in a phenomenal neighborhood was too good to pass on. My hope is that not having any snow is eased by all the snow events that will inevitably fizzle out up here.

Makes sense, you are a bit younger than me, I think if I was younger and had less tying me to this area I would be on my way to somewhere else.