PNW January 2023 Observations and Discussion

[Front Ranger]

23 minutes ago, snow_wizard said:

Very solid signal for below normal temps later in the month.  Now we have to wait and see how the details evolve.  Decent chance a lot of places will have three consecutive months with measurable snowfall.  Probably 4 assuming this all goes well.

IF that were to occur, it would be the first time since 2008-09 for SEA.

[Front Ranger]

9 minutes ago, Cascadia_Wx said:

Seems like you’re getting ahead of yourself a little. Just a few days ago you were bemoaning the winter climate here. It doesn’t always have to be one extreme or the other.

Unless one is bipolar, in which case it usually is.

[Doinko]

3 minutes ago, Front Ranger said:

IF that were to occur, it would be the first time since 2008-09 for SEA.

2010-2011 did have it as well but that was Nov-Feb instead of Dec-Mar. I don't think PDX has had that since 1961-62 but I might be missing something, since they only recorded a trace in Feb 2009.

[Deweydog]

HEAVY RAIN

[Doinko]

Looks like Corvallis still hasn't broken their subfreezing high streak. They just narrowly missed it in Feb 2021 and December 2022. Their last one was 32 in 2017 and 2016. They haven't had anything below that since Feb 2014 (23)

[Everleigh]

60.4°f here in Yelm. I have doors and windows open! I do like getting the chance to air the house out, but uhm....Winter? Hullo? You doin okay, friend? lol 

[TT-SEA]

56/46 day so far at SEA... good for at least +8 on the day.     Going to be close to +5.0 for January at the half way point.  

[TT-SEA]

1 minute ago, Everleigh said:

60.4°f here in Yelm. I have doors and windows open! I do like getting the chance to air the house out, but uhm....Winter? Hullo? You doin okay, friend? lol 

We have the house open as well... nice to chance to get all fresh air in here.

[snow_wizard]

The CFS sure seems to like our chances the last several runs.  I like having that on board when things start to look promising in this time frame.

[snow_wizard]

1 minute ago, TT-SEA said:

We have the house open as well... nice to chance to get all fresh air in here.

This kind of has a 1996 vibe for me.  The first half of that month had some days just like this.  Really nice finish on that one.

[snow_wizard]

6 minutes ago, Everleigh said:

60.4°f here in Yelm. I have doors and windows open! I do like getting the chance to air the house out, but uhm....Winter? Hullo? You doin okay, friend? lol 

It's downhill from today according to all of the models.

[snow_wizard]

16 minutes ago, Doinko said:

Looks like Corvallis still hasn't broken their subfreezing high streak. They just narrowly missed it in Feb 2021 and December 2022. Their last one was 32 in 2017 and 2016. They haven't had anything below that since Feb 2014 (23)

They didn't do it in December?

[snow_wizard]

And yet another day with gusty east winds here.  Getting really sick of cleaning up the yard this winter.

[Doinko]

Just now, snow_wizard said:

They didn't do it in December?

Yeah, OSU had a high of 34 and 33. Though the rest of the area might have. Their last high significantly below freezing was 23 degrees in February 2014 and 25 degrees in December 2013. 

[snow_wizard]

A lot of 40s and 50s east of the Cascades today as well.  Kind of weird how cold snaps and torches both usually have a crescendo at the very end.

[TT-SEA]

7 minutes ago, snow_wizard said:

This kind of has a 1996 vibe for me.  The first half of that month had some days just like this.  Really nice finish on that one.

Yeah... big crash in 1996 then back into 60s in the middle of February.   Reached 70 at Snoqualmie Falls and 65 at SEA.

I think its really nice to go back and forth between spectacular weather like this and cold/snow during the winter.    Good variety.

[snow_wizard]

3 minutes ago, Doinko said:

Yeah, OSU had a high of 34 and 33. Though the rest of the area might have. Their last high significantly below freezing was 23 degrees in February 2014 and 25 degrees in December 2013. 

Just amazing they have missed out on so many cold waves the last several years.  Ones both from the north and the east.

[BLI snowman]

11 minutes ago, icyasf said:

I think the airport had a high of 28 on December 22nd, and so did most places in town but the Oregon State University station isn’t actually in town or near the university its north of town closer to Albany and they only had a high of 33F.

I don't think there's any way that anyone in the Willamette Valley got to or above freezing on the 22nd. I certainly didn't see any evidence of it.

[TT-SEA]

4 minutes ago, snow_wizard said:

And yet another day with gusty east winds here.  Getting really sick of cleaning up the yard this winter.

Not fun to have huge trees right over your house and yard.   The east wind never makes a mess here... in fact it usually cleans up the yard.

[snow_wizard]

1 minute ago, TT-SEA said:

Yeah... big crash in 1996 then back into 60s in the middle of February.   Reached 70 at Snoqualmie Falls and 65 at SEA.

I think its really nice to go back and forth between spectacular weather like this and cold/snow during the winter.    Good variety.

I'm good with today.  It is certainly nice aside from the wind.

[snow_wizard]

Just now, TT-SEA said:

Not fun to have huge trees right over your house and yard.   The east wind never makes a mess here... in fact it usually cleans up the yard.

We got rid of a couple of trees recently so it's not as bad as it used to be.  At least all of the wind has kept our driveway and rooftop clean this winter.

[Doinko]

Just now, snow_wizard said:

Just amazing they have missed out on so many cold waves the last several years.  Ones both from the north and the east.

They did quite well in December 2021 I think, 8.5" of snow. They've had the 4-7" snowstorm in December 2013 and 14-18" snowstorm in February 2014 but nothing much in terms of cold since I think.

What numbers did the Puget Sound put up in February 2014 for cold? We had a 22/18 day on 2/6 at the coldest.

[Doinko]

2 minutes ago, BLI snowman said:

I don't think there's any way that anyone in the Willamette Valley got to or above freezing on the 22nd. I certainly didn't see any evidence of it.

They also had a colder high on the 24th than the 23th and 22nd. Some timing issue or something? Didn't most of the Valley warm up on the 24th and some places got above 50?

[snow_wizard]

1 minute ago, Doinko said:

They did quite well in December 2021 I think, 8.5" of snow. They've had the 4-7" snowstorm in December 2013 and 14-18" snowstorm in February 2014 but nothing much in terms of cold since I think.

What numbers did the Puget Sound put up in February 2014 for cold? We had a 22/18 day on 2/6 at the coldest.

I had a 26/18 here in Feb 2014. That was with constant wind and cloud cover so quite impressive in that regard.

[Cascadia_Wx]

5 minutes ago, snow_wizard said:

Just amazing they have missed out on so many cold waves the last several years.  Ones both from the north and the east.

I think there must have been something off about that station or its readings. Even Eugene had a sub-freezing high that day.

[Doinko]

Just now, snow_wizard said:

I had a 26/18 here in Feb 2014. That was with constant wind and cloud cover so quite impressive in that regard.

The wind with that blast was really impressive. I wasn't here for the December 2022 one which I think might've been a bit windier but the combination of wind, heavy snow and temps in the teens made that event really memorable.

[snow_wizard]

58 minutes ago, Doinko said:

Unrelated but I was wondering, do you have any information about some March events in the 1800s? I was looking up a bunch from the 20th century and some really surprised me like 1951, 1960, and 1906

March 1865, 1867, and 1870 were incredible in their own ways.  Ridiculous run of good Marches in there.  1852 also had a big snow early in the month.  At least up this way.  Later in the century both 1896 and 1897 had notable cold and snow.

[BLI snowman]

6 minutes ago, Doinko said:

They also had a colder high on the 24th than the 23th and 22nd. Some timing issue or something? Didn't most of the Valley warm up on the 24th and some places got above 50?

That station (and most other non-airport stations) uses 24 hour periods ending at 8am for their records, but I don't think they reached 33 between 8am on the 22nd and 8am on the 23rd. Likely just a faulty reading.

[snow_wizard]

BTW...for my money I would pick the 1860s as being the greatest decade for winter weather on record here.  Just a smorgasbord of great months!

[snow_wizard]

1 hour ago, Cascadia_Wx said:

Seems like you’re getting ahead of yourself a little. Just a few days ago you were bemoaning the winter climate here. It doesn’t always have to be one extreme or the other.

I did say decent chance.  Not anywhere near certain.

[TT-SEA]

10 minutes ago, snow_wizard said:

BTW...for my money I would pick the 1860s as being the greatest decade for winter weather on record here.  Just a smorgasbord of great months!

Someone had posted a link detailing the flooding in CA in 1862 and I found it interesting that they went right back to very bad drought immediately.    By 1863 and 1864 they said that they had mass die off of cattle in CA because it was so dry again.

[BLI snowman]

5 minutes ago, snow_wizard said:

BTW...for my money I would pick the 1860s as being the greatest decade for winter weather on record here.  Just a smorgasbord of great months!

Still had a couple of duds interestingly enough. 1860-61 was pretty dull with just one short lived event in late January and 1868-69 was apparently a classic wall-to-wall Nino turd in the vein of some of our more modern gems (1991-92, 2002-03).

[snow_wizard]

2 minutes ago, TT-SEA said:

Someone had posted a link detailing the flooding in CA in 1862 and I found it interesting that they went right back to very bad drought immediately.    By 1863 and 1864 they said that they had mass die off of cattle in CA because it was so dry again.

Wow!  I wasn't aware of that.

[snow_wizard]

1 minute ago, BLI snowman said:

Still had a couple of duds interestingly enough. 1860-61 was pretty dull with just one short lived event in late January and 1868-69 was apparently a classic wall-to-wall Nino turd in the vein of some of our more modern gems (1991-92, 2002-03).

It is amazing how even back then the turds were absolutely terrible.

[Deweydog]

23 minutes ago, Doinko said:

The wind with that blast was really impressive. I wasn't here for the December 2022 one which I think might've been a bit windier but the combination of wind, heavy snow and temps in the teens made that event really memorable.

February 2014 was a much deeper advection event which led to a larger area being affected by the winds. Last month’s gradient was stronger but much more shallow. We ended up with full on mountain wave conditions here on the 5th from the advection alone. 

[MossMan]

Just an unbelievably gorgeous day! Spent the morning with my dog training friends up in Mt Vernon. So nice and warm! Up to 56 degrees back at home now. Reminds me of 1/13/19…So it’s most definitely coming! 

[TT-SEA]

2 minutes ago, MossMan said:

Just an unbelievably gorgeous day! Spent the morning with my dog training friends up in Mt Vernon. So nice and warm! Up to 56 degrees back at home now. Reminds me of 1/13/19…So it’s most definitely coming! 

Grass is in deep dormancy there.   Very, very brown.   

[Cold Snap]

Great day in Leavenworth! Besides the fact it’s 39 with light rain. Tons of snow on the ground though! 

[RentonHill]

Hmmm

[TT-SEA]

59 at SEA... might just get to 60 today.