PNW January 2023 Observations and Discussion

[NWbyNW]

50mph wind gusts expected for the North Sound tonight and into Sunday morning.  Cold temperatures as well, with wind chill, some downright chilly temps.  

Frigid air pouring out the Fraser River Valley is causing some strong gusts in Whatcom and San Juan Counties.  A 39mpg at Bellingham International Airport and a 53mph at Sandy Point south of Birch Bay.  37mph at Lynden and 35mph at Sumas. 

In the San Juans we can see a 31mph at Eastsound and 32mph at Friday Harbor.  37mph on Lopez Island.  

The gusts continue to Clallam and Jefferson Counties with Port Angeles hitting a 32mph wind gust and Lake Crescent a 38mph. 

The Eagle Rocks in British Columbia, south of Victoria, saw a 53mph gust,  Oak Bay hit 37mph, and Discovery Island 44mph. 39mph reported at Abbotsford National Airport. 

[MR.SNOWMIZER]

Just had a brief heavy snow shower and very strong winds.

[Kayla]

Already dropped down to -10F here with a wind chill of -25F. Gonna be a long brisk night!

Temps look to struggle to warm above double digit below zero temps tomorrow.

[Gradient Keeper]

00z GFS Day 10-16

[Gradient Keeper]

2 minutes ago, Kayla said:

Already dropped down to -10F here with a wind chill of -25F. Gonna be a long brisk night!

Temps look to struggle to warm above double digit below zero temps tomorrow.

That is crazy cold!

[Kayla]

2 minutes ago, Gradient Keeper said:

That is crazy cold!

Won't be anything close to the December cold and likely nothing record breaking but still a pretty impressive cold shot!

[icyasf]

rain/snow mix!!

[Frontal Snowsquall]

2 hours ago, TonyP said:

Really weird precip, not as frozen as typical hail, it’s kind of fluffier??

 

2 hours ago, Phil said:

Corn snow aka graupel.

 

1 hour ago, kokaneekidz said:

Graupel is the terminology.  Comes from German language 

My favorite term is tapioca snow.

snow pellets

(Also called soft hail, graupel, tapioca snow.) Precipitation consisting of white, opaque, approximately round (sometimes conical) iceparticles having a snowlike structure, and from about 2 mm to less than 5 mm in diameter.

https://glossary.ametsoc.org/wiki/Snow_pellets

 

[Gradient Keeper]

00z ECMWF Day 1

[Rubus Leucodermis]

Down to 32.0˚F.

[Gradient Keeper]

Day 2

[Phil]

1 hour ago, TT-SEA said:

I am no PV expert... but this does not look like a split to me.  

Definitely not a split. Some shrinkage for sure but that is indeed a fully intact PV.  

[Gradient Keeper]

Pretty good east wind gust just now! Roaring pretty good. Nothing close to this in previous hours.

[MWG]

We have been stuck in 43F since like 6:30pm 

[Gradient Keeper]

Day 3

[MossMan]

34 degrees.

DP 18.

Breezy. 

My deck is finally dry! 

[Gradient Keeper]

1 minute ago, MossMan said:

34 degrees.

DP 18.

Breezy. 

My deck is finally dry! 

Things are looking up in Randyville!

[Gradient Keeper]

Day 4

[Gradient Keeper]

I knew it was going to become a bit gusty, but this is stronger than I expected. Almost enough to keep me awake.

[snow_wizard]

49 minutes ago, Gradient Keeper said:

00z GFS Day 10-16

Tons of potential coming up.

[Gradient Keeper]

1 minute ago, snow_wizard said:

Tons of potential coming up.

It seems like there's a potential for potential, potentially that is.

[snow_wizard]

I must say another cold February would really be pushing the envelope even by historical standards, but it sure looks highly possible at this point.  Just amazing to think 2011, 2014, 2017, 2018, 2019, and 2021 all had solid cold and or snow in Feb.  Even last year had some decently cold weather and snow late in the month.  Just plain weird.

[SilverFallsAndrew]

Hmmmm not a terrible GFS 

[Gradient Keeper]

Day 5'er

[snow_wizard]

Wow!  I had forgotten the last two days of Feb 2022 had 4.74 inches of rain here after a 5 day cold snap that delivered 1.6" of snow.

[snow_wizard]

1 minute ago, SilverFallsAndrew said:

Hmmmm not a terrible GFS 

There have been many runs that show things getting good.  The 12z EPS control and several CFS runs as well.

[snow_wizard]

Even Feb 2018...

I had a 9 day average of 33.1 with 2.4" of snow during the second half of the month.

[Gradient Keeper]

Day 6

[Gradient Keeper]

Day 7

[Gradient Keeper]

This literally feels like the slowest or longest Euro run ever.... ugh. C'mon....

[LowerGarfield]

It was 19F when I last checked about twenty minutes ago. Continues to drop.

[Gradient Keeper]

Day 8....

[Gradient Keeper]

Day 9'er

[ShawniganLake]

33F here.  Gonna freeze tonight. 

[Gradient Keeper]

00z GEFS

[snow_wizard]

2 hours ago, TT-SEA said:

I am no PV expert... but this does not look like a split to me.  

I was talking about the 500mb PV.  The SSW is apparently going to disrupt it.

[Gradient Keeper]

Back to the captivating Euro. Day 10

[Phishy Wx]

Clear and down to 15 and wind has almost completely slacked off

might get colder than that forecasted 8

 

[Gradient Keeper]

00z ECMWF 10 Day Rainfall, Snowfall totals

[snow_wizard]

14 minutes ago, ShawniganLake said:

33F here.  Gonna freeze tonight. 

Some places will probably get a hard freeze tonight, and many places will tomorrow night.

[snow_wizard]

1 minute ago, Gradient Keeper said:

00z ECMWF 10 Day Rainfall, Snowfall totals

Dry.

[snow_wizard]

3 minutes ago, Phishy Wx said:

Clear and down to 15 and wind has almost completely slacked off

might get colder than that forecasted 8

 

Yeah.  Things are settling down pretty quickly here too.

[WeatherGeek2022]

someone make western WA weather stop being boring plz.

[Phishy Wx]

well this is depressing

 

Hinman Glacier has disappeared 

 

https://www.krem.com/article/tech/science/environment/washingtons-hinman-glacier-gone/293-f8d476d5-dd20-43de-905e-56b1435fefd6

 

SEATTLE — The largest glacier between the high peaks of Mount Rainier and Glacier Peak has melted away after a long battle with global warming.

For thousands of years, the Hinman Glacier graced the crest of the Washington Cascades in what is now King County.

Fifty miles due east of downtown Seattle, Mount Hinman sits deep in the Alpine Lakes Wilderness, midway between Snoqualmie Pass and Stevens Pass.

Nichols College glaciologist Mauri Pelto led a team to Mount Hinman in August 2022, as he has most summers since 1984. This time, they found its namesake glacier was no more.

In its place were just a few stranded patches of snow and ice.

“This is the biggest North Cascade glacier to completely disappear,” Pelto told KUOW. “I’ve seen a bunch of small glaciers disappear, and to see one of the larger glaciers disappear is more striking.”

Until recently, the Hinman was one of four named glaciers that provided cool water to the Skykomish River in the hottest, driest time of the year.

The glaciers of the Skykomish basin have lost 55% of their surface area since the 1950s, according to Pelto.

“What that means is, you have 55% less of an ice cube there to melt all summer long,” Pelto said.

As the Hinman dwindled to almost nothing in recent decades, late-summer flows got lower in the Skykomish River, bad news for salmon and farmers.

The Hinman Glacier was ancient, though how ancient is unknown. It might date from the retreat of the Cordilleran ice sheet, which left glaciers atop the Cascades and Olympics 14,000 years ago. Pelto said there is strong evidence that the Hinman was older than the explosion of Mount Mazama, which created Oregon’s Crater Lake, 7,000 years ago.

In the 1950s, the Hinman Glacier flowed a mile and a half from the broad top of 7,492-foot Mount Hinman to the valley floor nearly 2,000 feet below.

Mount Hinman and its neighbors gained protection from direct human disturbance in 1976 when they were designated part of the Alpine Lakes Wilderness. But that designation couldn’t protect Hinman’s snow and ice from a warming climate: They were no match for the rising temperatures of the fossil fuel era.

“Once the largest glacier between Mount Rainier and Glacier Peak,” mountain climber and guidebook author Fred Beckey wrote in the 2000 edition of his Cascade Alpine Guide, “the Hinman Glacier has separated into three masses, with a greatly diminished area.”

In 1958, the Hinman Glacier covered 320 acres, about half the size of Seattle’s Lake Union. In August 2022, the biggest patch of ice Pelto’s team found was about 10 acres—too small and too thin to flow, the defining characteristic of the moving ice masses called glaciers.

Glaciers are rivers of ice. They flow from year to year, as their own weight compresses snow into ice, and generate striking features like deep crevasses and deep-blue ice, sculpting the land beneath them as they go.

Another glacier on Mount Hinman, the Lower Foss, preceded the Hinman into oblivion, while one other, the Foss, remains, though it has shrunken by 70% since the 1950s.

The rounded peak and the glacier on its northwest side were named for Everett dentist and mountain climber Harry B. Hinman in 1934. He started the Everett branch of the Mountaineers in 1911.

Few people ever touched the Hinman Glacier, reachable only by off-trail scrambling and mountaineering deep inside the rugged Alpine Lakes Wilderness.

But the Hinman touched many people by keeping the Skykomish River cool and flowing each summer and providing water for fish and farmers when they needed it most.

RIP (rest in precipitation), Hinman Glacier.

[snow_wizard]

2 minutes ago, Phishy Wx said:

well this is depressing

 

Hinman Glacier has disappeared 

 

https://www.krem.com/article/tech/science/environment/washingtons-hinman-glacier-gone/293-f8d476d5-dd20-43de-905e-56b1435fefd6

 

SEATTLE — The largest glacier between the high peaks of Mount Rainier and Glacier Peak has melted away after a long battle with global warming.

For thousands of years, the Hinman Glacier graced the crest of the Washington Cascades in what is now King County.

Fifty miles due east of downtown Seattle, Mount Hinman sits deep in the Alpine Lakes Wilderness, midway between Snoqualmie Pass and Stevens Pass.

Nichols College glaciologist Mauri Pelto led a team to Mount Hinman in August 2022, as he has most summers since 1984. This time, they found its namesake glacier was no more.

In its place were just a few stranded patches of snow and ice.

“This is the biggest North Cascade glacier to completely disappear,” Pelto told KUOW. “I’ve seen a bunch of small glaciers disappear, and to see one of the larger glaciers disappear is more striking.”

Until recently, the Hinman was one of four named glaciers that provided cool water to the Skykomish River in the hottest, driest time of the year.

The glaciers of the Skykomish basin have lost 55% of their surface area since the 1950s, according to Pelto.

“What that means is, you have 55% less of an ice cube there to melt all summer long,” Pelto said.

As the Hinman dwindled to almost nothing in recent decades, late-summer flows got lower in the Skykomish River, bad news for salmon and farmers.

The Hinman Glacier was ancient, though how ancient is unknown. It might date from the retreat of the Cordilleran ice sheet, which left glaciers atop the Cascades and Olympics 14,000 years ago. Pelto said there is strong evidence that the Hinman was older than the explosion of Mount Mazama, which created Oregon’s Crater Lake, 7,000 years ago.

In the 1950s, the Hinman Glacier flowed a mile and a half from the broad top of 7,492-foot Mount Hinman to the valley floor nearly 2,000 feet below.

Mount Hinman and its neighbors gained protection from direct human disturbance in 1976 when they were designated part of the Alpine Lakes Wilderness. But that designation couldn’t protect Hinman’s snow and ice from a warming climate: They were no match for the rising temperatures of the fossil fuel era.

“Once the largest glacier between Mount Rainier and Glacier Peak,” mountain climber and guidebook author Fred Beckey wrote in the 2000 edition of his Cascade Alpine Guide, “the Hinman Glacier has separated into three masses, with a greatly diminished area.”

In 1958, the Hinman Glacier covered 320 acres, about half the size of Seattle’s Lake Union. In August 2022, the biggest patch of ice Pelto’s team found was about 10 acres—too small and too thin to flow, the defining characteristic of the moving ice masses called glaciers.

Glaciers are rivers of ice. They flow from year to year, as their own weight compresses snow into ice, and generate striking features like deep crevasses and deep-blue ice, sculpting the land beneath them as they go.

Another glacier on Mount Hinman, the Lower Foss, preceded the Hinman into oblivion, while one other, the Foss, remains, though it has shrunken by 70% since the 1950s.

The rounded peak and the glacier on its northwest side were named for Everett dentist and mountain climber Harry B. Hinman in 1934. He started the Everett branch of the Mountaineers in 1911.

Few people ever touched the Hinman Glacier, reachable only by off-trail scrambling and mountaineering deep inside the rugged Alpine Lakes Wilderness.

But the Hinman touched many people by keeping the Skykomish River cool and flowing each summer and providing water for fish and farmers when they needed it most.

RIP (rest in precipitation), Hinman Glacier.

Sad, but the article is unfortunately politicized.  No evidence it wouldn't have happened even if we weren't burning fossil fuels.  The Earth goes through gigantic warming and cooling periods all by itself.  Sea levels rose hundreds of feet after the last ice age with no help from man whatsoever.  Just drives me nuts they had to politicize this.

The hot summers are to blame for the glaciers retreating more than anything going on during the winters.  Total bummer.

[Perturbed Member]

Looks like you really had to get up closer to 1500ft for accumulation in the coast range tonight.

[Timmy]

Just landed at pdx from Denver. Got a nice delay as the snow started just as we were getting onto the plane. Had to de-ice and all that. Fun to watch snow falling as the temp dropped into the teens.

[Timmy]

3 minutes ago, Perturbed Member said:

Looks like you really had to get up closer to 1500ft for accumulation in the coast range tonight.

Lots of reports of accumulation 500’+ in Columbia county.

[Gradient Keeper]

Looks like its still there to me.

[snow_wizard]

Looks like a 43/32 here today.  Pretty chilly.