October 2022 PNW weather Discussion. + Ultimate Leg Reveal Extravaganza

[Gradient Keeper]

6 minutes ago, Deweydog said:

The SE’erly component is always a big sign that the gradient is rapidly shallowing. 

Yep, but dang it's taking its own sweet time switching the pressure pattern.

[MossMan]

Wow! And climbing rapidly. Was sweating while blowing tinder dry leaves. 

[Gradient Keeper]

3 minutes ago, MossMan said:

Wow! And climbing rapidly. Was sweating while blowing tinder dry leaves. 

New trend? Everyone show their leaf blower with yard, sidewalk, driveway covered or not covered by leaves?

[FroYoBro]

I can tell the wind has started to shift here just by looking at the temperature. It has really stalled here. Been around 79 degrees since noon. 

[Rubus Leucodermis]

72˚F and smoky here.

I knew the solutions calling for this ridge to be super-torchy would verify, but sometimes I hate being right. Thankfully, we seem to be on the cusp of clearing the five-day hurdle on the modeled pattern change.

[Sonny Summers]

I don't know if this event goes beyond weak.

[Meatyorologist]

Been a good while since I've seen temps verify way too warm this badly here. April 2016 maybe? Even then, that was by 5F or so. Today I am gawking at errors on the order of 10F, 15F, maybe more? There is a 91F reading up the hill. I am sweating in the shade.

One of the weirdest weather days I can remember. Haven't felt this way since June 2021.

[selkirks]

Decided to do errands over in Issaquah today to get out of the smoke and while it is 84° right now over here, I will say it does still feel like fall with the sun angle.

It just feels like fall normally feels until early October over in Spokane, not in western Washington. 

[Deweydog]

32 minutes ago, Tyler Mode said:

Ya I noticed the smoke plume shifted just before the flare up...which has since died down.  Lots of ash falling here.

It seemed like the blowup was associated with the switch in gradient angle. Yesterday afternoon we got a good look at the area and there was no activity whatsoever. NE’erlies were howling at that point.

[TacomaWx]

82 here. Not sure how much higher we will go or if we will kinda stall out from here on out. 

[Doinko]

Wow, 84 at SeaTac and 85 at PDX

[Kolk1604]

Looks like a good chance to keep the PNA negative through the end of the month 

[SnowWillarrive]

49 minutes ago, Meatyorologist said:

88F at my house! Unbelievable!! Where did this come from???!! Rocketing wayyyy past any and all expectations and it's barely 1pm

I’m seriously concerned will hit 90 degrees 

[Chewbacca Defense]

I'm gonna call it now, Seattle radar is going to sh*t the bed when the first wave of rain hits the Olympics.

[Winterdog]

Up to 77 now after a low of 40, gonna have a serious daily diurnal variation.  A beautiful day being made more beautiful with the promise of a major change in the works.

 

[SnowWillarrive]

17 minutes ago, TacomaWx said:

82 here. Not sure how much higher we will go or if we will kinda stall out from here on out. 

Just hit 90 degrees here in the foothills. I can see a small fire that just ignited outside Mount Rainier NP.
 

Feels like the apocalypse. 

[snow_wizard]

55 minutes ago, Sonny Summers said:

I don't know if this event goes beyond weak.

I think being around -1.0 is moderate.

EDIT:  Looks like -0.9 is the very low (cold) end of weak.  Still a decent Nina.

[snow_wizard]

Sitting at 85 now.  It is irritatingly warm out there.  If my low of 73 were to hold I would be looking at a +30 departure today.

[Sonny Summers]

Just now, snow_wizard said:

I think being around -1.0 is moderate.

There are some great weak la niña winters. I don't know if it even matters. The +QBO is also in our favor.

[Kolk1604]

More and more members are forecasting snow for pierce county...

[snow_wizard]

Now this is interesting.  Some people consider the MEI to be a better measure of ENSO and it is squarely in strong Nina territory.  Actually as strong 1988 on the last update.  That makes the current weather seem even more likely to result in a major reckoning moving forward.  Another thing I noticed is the 1998 - 2001 La Nina had a less impressive MEI.  Might account for the not so great winters on that one.

MEI.v2: NOAA Physical Sciences Laboratory

[Sonny Summers]

3 minutes ago, snow_wizard said:

Now this is interesting.  Some people consider the MEI to be a better measure of ENSO and it is squarely in strong Nina territory.  Actually as strong 1988 on the last update.  That makes the current weather seem even more likely to result in a major reckoning moving forward.

MEI.v2: NOAA Physical Sciences Laboratory

That's almost as low as 2010.

[Christensen87]

Driving through Bellevue in the Jeep, 90° currently. I hate this. 

[snow_wizard]

2 minutes ago, Sonny Summers said:

That's almost as low as 2010.

Indeed.  1988 and 2010 were the lowest and both winters had major cold waves with extreme blocking.  I really like our chances.

[snow_wizard]

The wind has almost stopped here now.  Such a weird situation with it this hot but dp at freezing.  Don't know what to expect when the sun goes down.

[snow_wizard]

16 minutes ago, Kolk1604 said:

More and more members are forecasting snow for pierce county...

Not out of the question given the analogs to the expected pattern.  It has snowed in October before.

[Sonny Summers]

Just now, snow_wizard said:

Indeed.  1988 and 2010 were the lowest and both winters had major cold waves with extreme blocking.  I really like our chances.

Both of those winters had a +QBO. 

[Gradient Keeper]

14 minutes ago, snow_wizard said:

Now this is interesting.  Some people consider the MEI to be a better measure of ENSO and it is squarely in strong Nina territory.  Actually as strong 1988 on the last update.  That makes the current weather seem even more likely to result in a major reckoning moving forward.  Another thing I noticed is the 1998 - 2001 La Nina had a less impressive MEI.  Might account for the not so great winters on that one.

MEI.v2: NOAA Physical Sciences Laboratory

Yeah that is. Nice find!

00z ECMWF in 8 hours 7 minutes

[joelgombiner]

I've always been 

18 minutes ago, Sonny Summers said:

There are some great weak la niña winters. I don't know if it even matters. The +QBO is also in our favor.

I've always been impressed by the weak correlation between ENSO and our climate. I remember hearing the Washington state climatologist say that ENSO has little predictive power for Washington weather. 

[Cascadia_Wx]

Let’s talk about how awesome the turn around from this heat was in a few weeks when we actually have some numbers to crunch. For now we’re just sitting in the midst of yet another record setting warm event and speculating on some cool weather (which will likely be watered down) in the mid to long range. I think for some folks that’s as good as it actually happening, but I try to keep my weather analysis based on things that actually occur in reality. It’s this weird quirk of mine.

[ShawniganLake]

2 minutes ago, snow_wizard said:

Not out of the question given the analogs to the expected pattern.  It has snowed in October before.

We will need things to trend quite a bit colder for the lowlands to see snow. 850s around 0C aren’t gonna produce much below pass level. 

[MossMan]

81 degrees. Humidity is down to 29%. It’s October 16th…Absolutely mind blowing.

[Meatyorologist]

89F here.

[Gradient Keeper]

Nakia Creek fire

Evacuation Zones have expanded significantly!

Here is the link to this interactive arcgis map > https://experience.arcgis.com/experience/19ce354ba5854fd1850e5aca55e4c534?fbclid=IwAR2rnWP-5APA0O0MKV_awL_SPHJECGlKFlDWuRU11MrqqhJggs1jxZrXu8o

[MV_snow]

3 minutes ago, DJ Droppin said:

Nakia Creek fire

Evacuation Zones have expanded significantly!

Here is the link to this interactive arcgis map > https://experience.arcgis.com/experience/19ce354ba5854fd1850e5aca55e4c534?fbclid=IwAR2rnWP-5APA0O0MKV_awL_SPHJECGlKFlDWuRU11MrqqhJggs1jxZrXu8o

Wow, all the way down to the river in Camas and Washougal. Not good.

[MV_snow]

A ridiculous 88 at my house and bone dry. Glad the 12z Euro still looks great for the pattern change and is not getting watered down yet despite widespread doom and gloom on here that it will eventually.

[Gradient Keeper]

2:48 PM Pressure Gradients

UPDATE

We're starting to see the offshore gradients ease up a little, but it appears models are trying to weaken them too quickly as they often do. In fact, today's 12z WRF-GFS forecast the PDX-DLS gradient to be down roughly -4mb by now which is 1.3mb too weak. By 5 PM it is forecast to be at -2mb which would be very light east wind. We'll see it it weakens that sharply over the next few hours. I hope so!

 

2 PM

[Gorge/Gap Gradients]
PDX-DLS: -5.3mb
TTD-DLS: -4.8mb

[Cross Cascade Gradients]
PDX-YKM: -6.2mb
PDX-MWH: -6.9mb
PDX-GEG: -8.2mb
OTH-GEG: -4.2mb

*Legend: PDX = Portland, DLS = The Dalles, TTD = Troutdale, YKM = Yakima, MWH = Moses Lake, GEG = Spokane, OTH = North Bend

A -Negative value denotes easterly/northerly flow
A +Positive value denotes westerly/onshore flow

[SilverFallsAndrew]

5 minutes ago, Cascadia_Wx said:

Let’s talk about how awesome the turn around from this heat was in a few weeks when we actually have some numbers to crunch. For now we’re just sitting in the midst of yet another record setting warm event and speculating on some cool weather (which will likely be watered down) in the mid to long range. I think for some folks that’s as good as it actually happening, but I try to keep my weather analysis based on things that actually occur in reality. It’s this weird quirk of mine.

That’s a really good point Jesse. If we look at the past few years things have not been balanced at all. The heat has far outweighed the cold. Sure our winters have featured a few nice cold snaps, but meaningful cold has really been limited to February 2019, October 2019, and April 2022, if we are talking about regionally top tier stuff. I don’t even have space to write about all the warmth we have experienced the past few years, and let’s not even get started on the past decade. Even though last December had legit Arctic air north of Seattle, the bigger anomalies happened at the beginning of the month. We also saw massive torching in January and February in many places across the PNW, especially where inversions weren’t in place. It has been 6 years since we saw a winter which didn’t feature epic torching at some point. If not for 3 days in February 2021, that would have been remembered as one of the most fruitless Ninas of all time. Yet I still have hope the worm will turn. 

[SilverFallsAndrew]

Fact is June- mid-August 2021 was unprecedented for our region. Follow that up with Mid-July- October 2022 having unprecedented heat which was even more persistent. To paraphrase Tim, even a near normal summer/early fall next year would be amazing. 

[Gradient Keeper]

It's gonna SNOW!