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In reference to the lack of snow in February, around Presidents’ Day.. When I was in high school (in Troutdale from ’89-’93) it snowed every year on my birthday (Feb 18th). Unfortunately, it has not snowed on my birthday since ’93!
In case anyone needs to know, the Sellwood Bridge will be closed Jan 17-24 while they MOVE IT. Yes, they are actually moving it 66 feet north to make room for the new one. I run across the bridge on weekends so glad I found this out.
The Oregon Chapter of the American Meteorological Society (AMS) is lining up some great weather meetings in January, February and March. After a very busy fall season, the Oregon AMS executive council decided to ease our way back into the new year with a fun and always entertaining no-host pizza social at Stark Street Pizza 9234 S.E. Stark Street Portland, next Thursday, January 24th at 7pm. For driving directions, see: http://starkstreetpizzaco.com/contact_info.html or Google the above address. There is no set topic at this meeting. Please feel free to bring your family members, children, significant others, etc… to this laid-back gathering. If you are not a current Oregon AMS member, feel free to show up and see what we are all about? Maybe you will sign up? As many of you know, Stark Street Pizza is famous for some of the best pizza and libations in Portland. This is an all-ages gathering. We have the large back room reserved, so let’s fill it up. We understand this meeting is fairly short notice, but we hope you can still swing in for a great time!
We are looking forward to seeing you all next Thursday evening, January 24th at 7pm at Stark Street Pizza in Portland!
Steve Pierce
President, Oregon Chapter of the American Meteorological Society (AMS)
In all seriousness, there are lots of AMS members from SW Washington, and many from down south of the metro area. As a member, I can say that anyone with an interest in the weather and the AMS should feel free to show up.
Phil is correct! All are welcome. If you can read this notice, please feel free to attend! That means all of Oregon and SW WA. Mark will be there to give us a Global Warming update! Just kidding!
This time of year it’ll hardly affect the snowpack. The sun is far too weak and it refreezes under a clear sky as soon as it sets. As Tyler mentioned, warm and wet weather is far more “damaging” to the snowpack. Now if it was early March and 55 degrees up there, the sun would melt it nicely.
Mark, I would like a weather expert opinion from you. What would you say the chances of an Arctic blast happening? In percentages the rest of the Winter.
Yeah tough when we are absolutely stuck for the
foreseeable–as the sands of time in the 2013
edition of the theoretical winter weather
window flow down through the hour glass. On the
upside, great window of opportunity to take a
scenic drive or hike somewhere without any
concern for harsh road or trail conditions! Kind
of a good time too to tune out from the weather
game–helps lessen frustration–which is hard
for we geeks. Maybe check back in a week or
so and see what’s what. Maybe by then something
will be emerging. We DO still have time–just
less of it by the day. I won’t give up hope
for at least a few weeks though!
Water content of the snow also affects its melt rate. That’s probably a very solid 53 inches of snow… this is something you experience in detail in Colorado
All I really want this Winter is one day where it snows constantly and drops 6-12 inches of snow and stays around for at least a couple of days. Is that too much to ask for God?
You might still be asking for too much. I’d start with intermittent snow showers with 1″ of accumulation. We got at least half of that equation yesterday.
I’ll even go as far as wanting quick burst of snow at night with 9 inches and then melting the next morning. Like what we got last year in Longview. It’s better than nothing and it seemed like it was late in the year.
I’d say another month for anything long lasting etc. I have always used Valentines day as the cut off for any major arctic outbreaks with any real consequence.
@Tyler: A pretty good rule of thumb, though I’ve seen such events happen a few days later, too, around President’s Day weekend. So the latter has always been my rule of thumb.
By the last week in February, it really seems too late. Even if the arctic air makes it here, the sun is just too bright and long-lasting for daytime highs to remain below freezing in the lowlands.
We haven’t had a real arctic blast with snow/cold lasting a whole day after around Valentines Day during my career here (21 years). But, there was a cold snow/ice/east wind storm in the first day or two of March back in the 1960s.
So early-mid February is it for a real big event.
You failed to read my whole sentence. “a real arctic blast with snow/cold lasting a whole day after around Valentines Day during my career here (21 years)”
Note I said “with snow/cold lasting a whole day”. Wasn’t it sunny during the February 2011 event??? Same in either 2005 or 2006 when we had a brief freeze the 2nd half of February but sunny and dry.
Yes, Mark said with snow. I thought of the 2006 event too but I remember very well it was sunny and dry and I think it stayed below freezing maybe one day and then the sun had us in the low 40s. No snow though. It was just a waste of prefectly good arctic air.
If I remember that event accurately, the arctic air originated clear over around Hudson Bay as part of the plolar vortex got tapped into. I remember people trying to figure out where the cold air was going to come from. Everyone expected it to come from AK or Canada (north) but it didn’t. Spokane got hit first the night before with rapid temperature drop and lots of wind. It plowed through here the next morning for one day. I was out pruning roses as it was or close to Presidents Day. No moisture at all. 24 hours and it was over.
February 26, 2011 was the last day with a sub-freezing high in my own records, 29.6F. That’s awfully late though. Sad that I haven’t had one for almost two winters now. There’s still time, but not a whole lot, and the models say no to about half of what’s left unless we get lucky and this inversion ends up colder at the surface than anticipated? Who knows…
Typical Jesse. Cherry pick what he reads. Doesn’t fully comprehend what he reads. Trys to make everyone look stupid. In the process looks stupid himself. Always fun to have him around.
Are ensembles (the charts Mark Nelson shows) readily available online, or are these secret sauce that must be paid for via broadcast TV station licenses, thus the only way to get them is for Mark to post them?…
I ask because it’s very easy for novices like myself to get a general idea of what “might” be coming down the road in terms of temps, and thus we can figure out much of the weather patterns from there.
Thanks Mike. So that’s the GFS. Thank you! Now in search of the ECMWF, which I will assume is locked away for the privileged – you know, those that actually pay for these systems, whereas I’m lookin’ for freebies of course ; )
There are a couple of big sun spots facing earth right now. Maybe with a little night time clearing and a big flare, we could get lucky. http://spaceweather.com/
If we have any major solar winds hit across the earth you can forget about late season Artic anything!
We almost won our lottery this year for cold but according to Space Weather dot com we had too many solar winds during Mid October-December with one after another (At least once per week) which gave Aurora spotters a piece of heaven. They were ecstatic this whole time.
One I saw we were having steady solar flares I knew our winter was done for but still hold out to a snowy spring.
This stinks we can’t even get la la land to show something interesting except for maybe an east wind. Well maybe we will actually get sunshine? Maybe if la la land looks warm and boring the opisite will happen?just like when it shows arctic air it gets warm ha ha wishful thinking!
For those hoping for some ice last night, I apologize, my fault. I spread some ice melt around the apartment complex we manage. Everytime I use that stuff it ends up not being needed.
National Weather Service Portland or
311 am PST Tuesday Jan 15 2013
Model mslp fields indicate that some northerly
gradient may develop this afternoon as a thermally induced surface trough strengthens over the north California/ S or coast. Then afternoon/evening clearing should be a little more effective each day from Wednesday through Friday as low level easterly flow begins to increase.
Only if you live in the mountains. Inversion means the lowlands will stay cold while the mountains warm up. That’s why it’s called an “inversion”; it inverts the normal order of things.
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Eeew! Smog much?
http://m.theatlanticcities.com/neighborhoods/2013/01/nasa-satellite-image-shows-beijing-drowning-lake-smog/4397/
There’s 30+ Million people under there, just breathing that junk in… :’(
getting a hint of clearing to the west up here. pink sky off on the horizon as the sun sets.
In reference to the lack of snow in February, around Presidents’ Day.. When I was in high school (in Troutdale from ’89-’93) it snowed every year on my birthday (Feb 18th). Unfortunately, it has not snowed on my birthday since ’93!
I’d change your birthday… better “luck” that way.
Thunder snow this morning in Dallas Texas very cool! Right in front of my hotel window coming towards me lightning and snow
Yep… People in my weather group were overjoyed. It looks like widespread 1/2″ to 3″ totals across north-central Texas. Sleet and ZR also reported.
It’s not 10 days like normal it is only 8! Progress!
There must be an Easterly component to the wind in Downtown, I smell Camas. And it’s cold, biting cold!
It doesn’t smell very good, does it…
You can see off shore flow in the low level cloud motion when looking at visible satellite.
Wow look at the sun up there looks nice!
http://www.tripcheck.com/popups/Cam.asp?curRegion=1&camera=1919
Check out Mt Hood Meadows at the lodge this morning. Temperature jumped 27 degrees in one hour.
2am: 24 degrees
3am: 51 degrees
http://www.wrh.noaa.gov/mesowest/getobext.php?sid=MHM52&table=1&banner=off
Well, if anything today’s 12z ECMWF hints at the pattern breaking down and turning transitory after day 8.
Sooner please…
In case anyone needs to know, the Sellwood Bridge will be closed Jan 17-24 while they MOVE IT. Yes, they are actually moving it 66 feet north to make room for the new one. I run across the bridge on weekends so glad I found this out.
OREGON AMS PIZZA SOCIAL = BE THERE!
The Oregon Chapter of the American Meteorological Society (AMS) is lining up some great weather meetings in January, February and March. After a very busy fall season, the Oregon AMS executive council decided to ease our way back into the new year with a fun and always entertaining no-host pizza social at Stark Street Pizza 9234 S.E. Stark Street Portland, next Thursday, January 24th at 7pm. For driving directions, see: http://starkstreetpizzaco.com/contact_info.html or Google the above address. There is no set topic at this meeting. Please feel free to bring your family members, children, significant others, etc… to this laid-back gathering. If you are not a current Oregon AMS member, feel free to show up and see what we are all about? Maybe you will sign up? As many of you know, Stark Street Pizza is famous for some of the best pizza and libations in Portland. This is an all-ages gathering. We have the large back room reserved, so let’s fill it up. We understand this meeting is fairly short notice, but we hope you can still swing in for a great time!
We are looking forward to seeing you all next Thursday evening, January 24th at 7pm at Stark Street Pizza in Portland!
Steve Pierce
President, Oregon Chapter of the American Meteorological Society (AMS)
Can you come to it if you are from Washington?
Steve’s from Washington, so I would say “YES!”.
In all seriousness, there are lots of AMS members from SW Washington, and many from down south of the metro area. As a member, I can say that anyone with an interest in the weather and the AMS should feel free to show up.
Phil is correct! All are welcome. If you can read this notice, please feel free to attend! That means all of Oregon and SW WA. Mark will be there to give us a Global Warming update! Just kidding!
Just had my strongest wind gust here since last Wednesday. Made it all the way up to 8 mph.
Yes,
My peak wind gust yesterday was 1mph! Happened twice. Never had a marine push without gusty west or NW winds.
Be safe, Tyler.
Anyone wanna guess how long it takes 53″ of snow to melt @ 50+ degrees?
http://www.nwac.us/weatherdata/skibowlgovtcamp/now/
Almost a 20deg bump in 1 hr up there this morning too… wow. Not going to look good up there in 10 days.
Hopefully it refreezes at night. At least it’s not 50 and raining. That would be bad.
Ya, snow melts less quickly in 40 and sun then it does in 40 and rain.
Wander’s Peak has joined the list of sites above the inversion:
http://www.wrh.noaa.gov/mesowest/getobext.php?sid=WPKO3&table=1&banner=off
This time of year it’ll hardly affect the snowpack. The sun is far too weak and it refreezes under a clear sky as soon as it sets. As Tyler mentioned, warm and wet weather is far more “damaging” to the snowpack. Now if it was early March and 55 degrees up there, the sun would melt it nicely.
Mark, I would like a weather expert opinion from you. What would you say the chances of an Arctic blast happening? In percentages the rest of the Winter.
Yeah tough when we are absolutely stuck for the
foreseeable–as the sands of time in the 2013
edition of the theoretical winter weather
window flow down through the hour glass. On the
upside, great window of opportunity to take a
scenic drive or hike somewhere without any
concern for harsh road or trail conditions! Kind
of a good time too to tune out from the weather
game–helps lessen frustration–which is hard
for we geeks. Maybe check back in a week or
so and see what’s what. Maybe by then something
will be emerging. We DO still have time–just
less of it by the day. I won’t give up hope
for at least a few weeks though!
Refreeze = ouch while falling continually learning to snowboard…
Water content of the snow also affects its melt rate. That’s probably a very solid 53 inches of snow… this is something you experience in detail in Colorado
Besides an approaching cooler trough @ hr 240 of the 12z euro not much happening.I sure hope we at least get east winds and sun in the valleys:-/
Pressure is 30.71″ and still rising here…
All I really want this Winter is one day where it snows constantly and drops 6-12 inches of snow and stays around for at least a couple of days. Is that too much to ask for God?
Yes
Your brevity says it all. Lol.
How about 2-3″ and stays around one day?
uh-oh, I’m at the bargaining phase, can depression be far behind?
Ok, we’ll start at 2 to 3 inches and talk from there.
You might still be asking for too much. I’d start with intermittent snow showers with 1″ of accumulation. We got at least half of that equation yesterday.
I’ll even go as far as wanting quick burst of snow at night with 9 inches and then melting the next morning. Like what we got last year in Longview. It’s better than nothing and it seemed like it was late in the year.
So everyone is all pessimistic about Winter but don’t we have like 1.5 to 2 months left of it??
I’d say another month for anything long lasting etc. I have always used Valentines day as the cut off for any major arctic outbreaks with any real consequence.
@Tyler: A pretty good rule of thumb, though I’ve seen such events happen a few days later, too, around President’s Day weekend. So the latter has always been my rule of thumb.
By the last week in February, it really seems too late. Even if the arctic air makes it here, the sun is just too bright and long-lasting for daytime highs to remain below freezing in the lowlands.
We haven’t had a real arctic blast with snow/cold lasting a whole day after around Valentines Day during my career here (21 years). But, there was a cold snow/ice/east wind storm in the first day or two of March back in the 1960s.
So early-mid February is it for a real big event.
Ummmm….February 2011?
I mean I guess it wasn’t that big of a blast. PDX just had two highs near freezing and set a record for latest low of 18 ever.
Was that within the time of your career here, Mark?
And then of course there was February 2006….
Ah, such a classic Jesse comment…
You failed to read my whole sentence. “a real arctic blast with snow/cold lasting a whole day after around Valentines Day during my career here (21 years)”
Note I said “with snow/cold lasting a whole day”. Wasn’t it sunny during the February 2011 event??? Same in either 2005 or 2006 when we had a brief freeze the 2nd half of February but sunny and dry.
Yes, Mark said with snow. I thought of the 2006 event too but I remember very well it was sunny and dry and I think it stayed below freezing maybe one day and then the sun had us in the low 40s. No snow though. It was just a waste of prefectly good arctic air.
If I remember that event accurately, the arctic air originated clear over around Hudson Bay as part of the plolar vortex got tapped into. I remember people trying to figure out where the cold air was going to come from. Everyone expected it to come from AK or Canada (north) but it didn’t. Spokane got hit first the night before with rapid temperature drop and lots of wind. It plowed through here the next morning for one day. I was out pruning roses as it was or close to Presidents Day. No moisture at all. 24 hours and it was over.
February 26, 2011 was the last day with a sub-freezing high in my own records, 29.6F. That’s awfully late though. Sad that I haven’t had one for almost two winters now. There’s still time, but not a whole lot, and the models say no to about half of what’s left unless we get lucky and this inversion ends up colder at the surface than anticipated? Who knows…
Typical Jesse. Cherry pick what he reads. Doesn’t fully comprehend what he reads. Trys to make everyone look stupid. In the process looks stupid himself. Always fun to have him around.
Wow… 29.6 even in the dome…. I am impressed.
It snowed 4 times at my house after Valentines day LAST YEAR.
Into the 50′s at meadows.
Now, is the winter of our…
http://i1040.photobucket.com/albums/b408/litfan/580x428xDisco-tent-copy-600x443_jpg_pagespeed_ic_zTohudWz3__zps873eca7f.jpg
LOL
Ha! Love it
Hilarious.
Are ensembles (the charts Mark Nelson shows) readily available online, or are these secret sauce that must be paid for via broadcast TV station licenses, thus the only way to get them is for Mark to post them?…
I ask because it’s very easy for novices like myself to get a general idea of what “might” be coming down the road in terms of temps, and thus we can figure out much of the weather patterns from there.
Only certain people have access to those we are not one of those people, I wanted to check them out as well!
Do you mean those “spaghetti graphs”? I think those are proprietary to paid subscriptions.
This ensemble image updates about 2-3 hours after each GFS run is finished.
http://www.wetterzentrale.de/pics/MT8_Portland_Oregon_USA_ens.png
Thanks Mike. So that’s the GFS. Thank you! Now in search of the ECMWF, which I will assume is locked away for the privileged – you know, those that actually pay for these systems, whereas I’m lookin’ for freebies of course ; )
Oh yeah, I forgot about the Niederschlaginmummum graph… Thanks Mike!
Keep an eye on that Hauptlauf
There are a couple of big sun spots facing earth right now. Maybe with a little night time clearing and a big flare, we could get lucky.
http://spaceweather.com/
If we have any major solar winds hit across the earth you can forget about late season Artic anything!
We almost won our lottery this year for cold but according to Space Weather dot com we had too many solar winds during Mid October-December with one after another (At least once per week) which gave Aurora spotters a piece of heaven. They were ecstatic this whole time.
One I saw we were having steady solar flares I knew our winter was done for but still hold out to a snowy spring.
We had freezing drizzle off and on all night up in the hills. It was a 10 mph white knuckle drive for the first 5 miles this morning.
This stinks we can’t even get la la land to show something interesting except for maybe an east wind. Well maybe we will actually get sunshine? Maybe if la la land looks warm and boring the opisite will happen?just like when it shows arctic air it gets warm ha ha wishful thinking!
Yeah, we’ve tried that… it doesn’t work that way.
For those hoping for some ice last night, I apologize, my fault. I spread some ice melt around the apartment complex we manage. Everytime I use that stuff it ends up not being needed.
you….
The temp is up to 34 now at Government Camp.
http://www.wrh.noaa.gov/mesowest/getobext.php?sid=GOV50&table=1&banner=off
33 degrees that is
Ok, time to move on now. Spring please come out!
35 degrees and still lightly drizzling when I left the house this morning. Any ice I had was gone.
Temps are warming up at Government Camp. The inversion is slowly lowering:
http://www.wrh.noaa.gov/mesowest/getobext.php?sid=GOV50&table=1&banner=off
Really hoping for a return of the East wind. Get rid of the moss/mold/muck.
http://www.wrh.noaa.gov/pqr/tower_temps/tower_temps.php?&units=F
National Weather Service Portland or
311 am PST Tuesday Jan 15 2013
Model mslp fields indicate that some northerly
gradient may develop this afternoon as a thermally induced surface trough strengthens over the north California/ S or coast. Then afternoon/evening clearing should be a little more effective each day from Wednesday through Friday as low level easterly flow begins to increase.
This shows the inversion working its way down very nicely.
http://www.atmos.washington.edu/~ovens/loops/wxloop.cgi?mm5d2_x_snd_kpdx+///3
Weather forecasters upset me. It’s Winter! It’s fine if it is cold.
So is this cold spell done for the time being now?
Only if you live in the mountains. Inversion means the lowlands will stay cold while the mountains warm up. That’s why it’s called an “inversion”; it inverts the normal order of things.
Oh ok. I just was confused because the temperature didn’t really drop here that much last night.
1/14/2013 Oregon (All) Temperature Summary
Warmest:
High:53 at Port Orford (US( 90 ft)
Low: 39 at BROOKINGS(79 ft)
Coldest:
High:12 at NYSSA(2172 ft) & NPOWDR(3212 ft) & Lakeview /Center(4750 ft)
Low: -15 at Lakeview, Lake C (4734 ft )
Largest Diurnal Change: 49 degrees
Crescent (41/-8 ) (4462 ft )
Heaviest Rainfall:
0.15″ at TILLAMOOK(11ft)
Still getting freezing drizzle and 31 degrees here at BG Lake. Icicles about 4-5″ long hanging off my canopy on my front porch
Done.
http://inws.wrh.noaa.gov/weather/alertinfo/8680766
we got drizzle, well more like a mist right now. the deck/cars have a glaze of ice but i think thats it.
34 and melting here now.
We really dodged a bullet tonight…
Since Pappoose is neglecting their duties….you in
W7 knows he’s in!
https://www.youtube.com/tv?vq=large#/watch?v=J2HBdRCroks&mode=transport