PNW September 2022 Wx Obs/Disc

[Phil]

And not to be a pompous prick, but I was also one of the few calling for a rapid restrengthening of the La Niña system, while even NOAA was giving it 50/50 odds. I had projected the development of the upwelling kelvin wave more than a month before it happened.

Just saying.

[Thunder98]

3 minutes ago, Phil said:

And not to be a pompous prick, but I was also one of the few calling for a rapid restrengthening of the La Niña system, while even NOAA was giving it 50/50 odds. I had projected the development of the upwelling kelvin wave more than a month before it happened.

Just saying.

La Nina needs to die a quick death and not comeback for 6 years

[kokaneekidz]

1 hour ago, RentonHillTC said:

Which part? I’m omw to twisp. Blewett was fine

Yeah Blewett coming down to the Y. That air gets locked in that valley, a few years back when Blewett had a fire it was tough to see going down the northside for me.

[RentonHill]

10 minutes ago, kokaneekidz said:

Yeah Blewett coming down to the Y. That air gets locked in that valley, a few years back when Blewett had a fire it was tough to see going down the northside for me.

Yes was super thick there. 

[SilverFallsAndrew]

Looks like its only 57 at the house still. A bit of clearing to the west here in Salem. Pleasant day. Good to see PDX break the dry streak. GFS looks dry, GEM wetter. Either way closer to normal temps should help the fire situation a bit. 

[RentonHill]

Its a beaut!

 

[Deweydog]

1 hour ago, Phil said:

That doesn’t make a lick of sense. I brought it up because it was only three years ago, and despite a mediocre pattern, it was one of the quietest fire seasons in the last 50 years.

And you predicted a cool August this year.  I always thought late summer would be warm/dry. The only month I missed was July. Please sit down.

Chances are she was sitting down when she typed that.

[Cloud]

6 minutes ago, RentonHillTC said:

Its a beaut!

 

This model has been way too consistent for it not to happen now. 

[Phil]

Long range GFS is trololololing me.

I’d weep tears of joy if that D10-16 solution verified. Been so long since we’ve killed off the summer circulation in September. Last several years it’s taken until mid/late October.

[Deweydog]

1 minute ago, Phil said:

Long range GFS is trololololing me.

I’d weep tears of joy if that D10-16 solution verified. Been so long since we’ve killed off the summer circulation in September. Last several years it’s taken until mid/late October.

#recencybias

[TigerWoodsLibido]

Looking good!

[Joshua Lake Oswego]

4 minutes ago, Phil said:

Long range GFS is trololololing me.

I’d weep tears of joy if that D10-16 solution verified. Been so long since we’ve killed off the summer circulation in September. Last several years it’s taken until mid/late October.

Looks like endless toughing for you 10+ days out.

 

Not looking so good for us out west. 

[SilverFallsAndrew]

Some of the level 3 evacuations around Oakridge and Westfir have been reduced to level 2. 

[SilverFallsAndrew]

Euro looks troughy, but pretty dry. Maybe we'll actually see September frost this year. 

[TigerWoodsLibido]

EC precip totals.

[Kayla]

2 hours ago, Phil said:

That doesn’t make a lick of sense. I brought it up because it was only three years ago, and despite a mediocre pattern, it was one of the quietest fire seasons in the last 50 years.

And you predicted a cool August this year.  I always thought late summer would be warm/dry. The only month I missed was July. Please sit down.

What do I do if I was already sitting down, should I stand!? This still doesn't explain why your argument against increasing fires in the west as a new norm is to reference a single quiet season.

To be clear, I was speaking about your knowledge of the summer and winter climate out west (since you have literally never lived out here) not your busted forecasts! I think we can all acknowledge that this summer didn't exactly pan out how we expected it to.

[TT-SEA]

12Z EPS... some troughing and then some ridging. 

[Chewbacca Defense]

20 minutes ago, Kayla said:

What do I do if I was already sitting down, should I stand!? This still doesn't explain why your argument against increasing fires in the west as a new norm is to reference a single quiet season.

To be clear, I was speaking about your knowledge of the summer and winter climate out west (since you have literally never lived out here) not your busted forecasts! I think we can all acknowledge that this summer didn't exactly pan out how we expected it to.

But....but.....what about Stampede Pass?  Does his time living there not count?

 

 

 

oh wait....

[Rubus Leucodermis]

Air quality in my neighbourhood has improved from horrible yesterday to only somewhat crummy today, but it’s pretty easy to tell, both on purpleair.com and just by looking in that direction, that it’s significantly worse closer to the North Shore Mountains, which I still cannot see, only a cloud of dirty smoky air in that direction.

[Rubus Leucodermis]

43 minutes ago, Kayla said:

To be clear, I was speaking about your knowledge of the summer and winter climate out west (since you have literally never lived out here) not your busted forecasts! I think we can all acknowledge that this summer didn't exactly pan out how we expected it to.

I still remember the time he expressed puzzlement at why just about everyone here, including many who are not into winter sports, paid so much attention to the winter snowpack in the mountains. “You don’t ski, it doesn’t affect you, why do you care so much?” That was literally his attitude.

[MossMan]

I am getting some decade old vibes from Phil lately. In other news, it’s a little humid feeling today. 

[Front Ranger]

Still looks really hazy/smoky in Seattle.

[Omegaraptor]

38 minutes ago, Rubus Leucodermis said:

I still remember the time he expressed puzzlement at why just about everyone here, including many who are not into winter sports, paid so much attention to the winter snowpack in the mountains. “You don’t ski, it doesn’t affect you, why do you care so much?” That was literally his attitude.

You can drive to this in less than two hours.

Phil can’t.

Makes me feel bad for Floridians. At least Phil can get to eastern WV or Garrett County in 4-5 hours.

[Phil]

1 hour ago, Kayla said:

What do I do if I was already sitting down, should I stand!? This still doesn't explain why your argument against increasing fires in the west as a new norm is to reference a single quiet season.

To be clear, I was speaking about your knowledge of the summer and winter climate out west (since you have literally never lived out here) not your busted forecasts! I think we can all acknowledge that this summer didn't exactly pan out how we expected it to.

Knowing you I’m sure you were running a half marathon at the time.

And that’s precisely my point. It’s myopic to assume the last few years are representative of a longer term, multidecadal normal.

The 1930s dust bowl was the most extreme climate anomaly ever recorded in the lower-48 and almost 20 years, but it was not a “new normal”. By the 1960s the dominant weather pattern(s) had completely reversed phase.

[NWbyNW]

Still under smoky skies throughout the region from Medford to Portland to Seattle, the Vancouver.  Weather forecasters got it wrong.  We'll be under smokey skies for a good part of the week I expect and sadly even worse for locations east of the Cascades. Much of the western regions are under moderate to unhealthy for sensitive groups AQI scores, while the east if unhealthy to hazardous. Based on the satellite imagery, you can see the smoke is blowing far, far east into the Dakota's and Wymong now. A lot of smoke still swirling off the Oregon, Washington, BC coast.  No major changes to the weather pattern expected for a few days, so I expect we will be under smoke, hazy skies.  Just not as thick as as it was, but never fully filtering away.

Pretty much every forecast had predicted by Monday we'd all be in the green, healthy air range with no smoke.  We aren't even close to that pipe dream.

 

 

[NWbyNW]

Since yesterday, it does not seem the Bolt Creek Fire has expanded all that much.  It is still within the known 7,600-8,000 acre range. Fire is now 2% contained. Still have evacuations going on unfortunately.  It's hard to get any news about the town's of Baring and Grotto, so we don't know for sure if the fire jumped US2 or reached those towns.  Both towns were told to evacuate over the weekend.  Cooler weather and some rain certainly were a God-send.

Level 3 (evacuate now!): Index 

Level 2 (Set): Between Index and Zeke’s 

Level 1 (Ready): Zeke’s to Gold Bar east city limits

[Meatyorologist]

Wonder if the 18z GFS will still be slathering its chops over cutting off that trough. Feels like it will break, but a similar situation happened back in July and the GFS won in the end. Hoping it's different this go around.

[Phil]

1 hour ago, Rubus Leucodermis said:

I still remember the time he expressed puzzlement at why just about everyone here, including many who are not into winter sports, paid so much attention to the winter snowpack in the mountains. “You don’t ski, it doesn’t affect you, why do you care so much?” That was literally his attitude.

Not true/out of context. But you know that.

We were debating whether 33°F rain is more enjoyable than warmer rain during the heart of winter.

[Phil]

11 minutes ago, Meatyorologist said:

Wonder if the 18z GFS will still be slathering its chops over cutting off that trough. Feels like it will break, but a similar situation happened back in July and the GFS won in the end. Hoping it's different this go around.

It was actually the GFS doing stupid things with cutoff ULLs throughout the spring/early summer. It would consistently cave to the ECMWF once inside day-6.

I actually saved all those gifs under the file name goofus. I’ve got something like 80-90 gifs in there.

[Omegaraptor]

7 minutes ago, Phil said:

Not true/out of context. But you know that.

We were debating whether 33°F rain is more enjoyable than warmer rain during the heart of winter.

33F rain > 50F rain

NW flow rain actually feels like winter. SW flow rain feels like bastardized fall. I typically feel zero chill to the air whatsoever in SW flow rain.

[Snownerd3000]

after the record -PDO observed last year, how do you think the warmer GoA will impact our winter?  I recall The Blob and Son of Blob being quite the spoiler over the last decade.  Does look like there has been a cooling trend but doubt it flips to another negative PDO.

[Phil]

3 minutes ago, Omegaraptor said:

33F rain > 50F rain

NW flow rain actually feels like winter. SW flow rain feels like bastardized fall. I typically feel zero chill to the air whatsoever in SW flow rain.

Yeah and that’s where I disagreed. IMO 33°F rain is super depressing. Being that close to snow/frozen but falling short would aggravate the hell out of me.

Though thankfully we don’t usually get “33°F rain” here unless it’s a CAD/inversion situation, in which case its preferable to ZR. Otherwise it’ll fall as snow even if it’s above freezing.

[Iceresistance]

6 minutes ago, Snownerd3000 said:

after the record -PDO observed last year, how do you think the warmer GoA will impact our winter?  I recall The Blob and Son of Blob being quite the spoiler over the last decade.  Does look like there has been a cooling trend but doubt it flips to another negative PDO.

The -PDO was one of the reasons why my area was absolutely scorching!

[SilverFallsAndrew]

Pretty sure PDO is still negative...

[Snownerd3000]

Maybe I misunderstand what constitutes a negative PDO but I was always under the impression it required lower than normal temps in the GoA.  Am I wrong on that?

[SilverFallsAndrew]

8 minutes ago, Snownerd3000 said:

Maybe I misunderstand what constitutes a negative PDO but I was always under the impression it required lower than normal temps in the GoA.  Am I wrong on that?

I think it's actually the opposite. Though I will be the first to admit I do not completely understand the phenomenon. 

[Snownerd3000]

23 minutes ago, SilverFallsAndrew said:

Pretty sure PDO is still negative...

you're not wrong.  We are still in a negative PDO. Here is a good write up on the subject if anyone is interested. 

 https://www.climate.gov/news-features/blogs/enso/going-out-ice-cream-first-date-pacific-decadal-oscillation

[Deweydog]

20 minutes ago, Snownerd3000 said:

Maybe I misunderstand what constitutes a negative PDO but I was always under the impression it required lower than normal temps in the GoA.  Am I wrong on that?

In a really crude, generalized manner the PDO is the inverse of the average anomalies in a box between 150w and 150e, 30n and 50n.

[Rubus Leucodermis]

49 minutes ago, Phil said:

Not true/out of context. But you know that.

We were debating whether 33°F rain is more enjoyable than warmer rain during the heart of winter.

You were in fact quite mystified as to the importance of mountain snow pack in a Western state.

 

[T-Town]

Alternating between really smoky and really incredibly mind numbingly f*cking smoky here in Bend.