This winter has been the most boring and mild we have seen in about 10 years. By “mild” I mean a lack of extremes and weather action, not the actual temps. I think the regular commenters on here most likely agree.
Other than some wet and windy systems coming up for the last 8 days of February, I don’t see anything too exciting in the foreseeable future. Models the past 24 hours have warmed slightly again for this weekend and early next week, enough that I think ANY sticking snow below 1,000′ is unlikely. I even think it’ll be tough to get sticking snow to 1,000′ in the West Hills early Saturday or late Monday night/Tuesday morning. That is the last chance this month for lower elevation snow.
So I think it’s time to stick a fork in winter HERE IN THE LOWLANDS WEST OF THE CASCADES, although in reality our winter was probably really over back around the last week of January. Generally, most real winter weather west of the Cascades occurs between November 15th and February 15th, especially the really cold and snowy/icy storms.
You see the details in the graphic below:
THIS MEANS WE COULD STILL SEE MEASURABLE SNOW IN PORTLAND, BUT IT’S UNLIKELY.
Most windstorms west of the Cascades tend to occur November-February, but in the past we HAVE seen windstorms in March and October. But the likelihood goes way down from here on out to spring.
A few questions you may have…
Should I take my studded tires off? Definitely not if your travel takes you up into the hills or mountains. In fact it’ll be very snowy in the Coast Range Friday night and Saturday morning. It sure doesn’t hurt to leave them on for another couple of weeks; but that’s up to you.
Should I uncover my faucets? Yes, no more significant freezing on the way. If you didn’t put on your studs this year (like Wayne Garcia), you just saved about $120!
Wait, last year you said winter was over in mid February and then we saw several inches afterwards; why should I believe you now? Good point, last year I said snow was unlikely below 1,000′…big screwup. Notice I changed the wording this year to say wet morning snow is still possible (but still unlikely). All the rest of last year’s “winter cancel post” was just fine.
For the geeks, I see the 00z GFS is around -5 to -6 with onshore flow Saturday morning and again late Monday/Tuesday, then it’s on to milder weather beyond that. That means it was time to cancel winter.
Chief Meteorologist Mark Nelsen
It is over let the daffodils sing oh but wait we still have Oregon spring break to get thru I remember snow flakes in Rock Away and following a plow thu the coast range home not to long ago. We are heading down to the beach next month so I hope it is in the 60s not the low 40s. Last spring break in the cold, Padre Island next year!
Finally, you stick the fork in it. Good job. I don’t think we’re gonna get any more snow this year, not even a dusting.
Possible atmospheric river setting up late next week. So says the NWS. They also say that it may set up further north over Washington and we would only get a glancing blow. I would guess that we would then be cloudy at least but maybe on the warm side of things being that we would be on the south side of it?
thinking of checking out bald peak viewpoint (1600ft) in the Chelaham mtns tmrw night sat morning. when do you think it will have switched to all snow? any chance of seeing accumulations up there?
COLD RAIN WARNING
NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE PORTLAND OR
1234 PM PST WED FEB 21 2013
(AUDIO) http://tinypic.com/r/1zr13yd/6
I will take an overnight snowstorm that melts the next morning at this point.
‘Snowstorm’?? Dandruff maybe, but that’s not even gonna happen it looks like now.
dug down about 18- 24 inches in the ground yesterday and never saw it as dry as it was that shallow. I hope the trees don’t get weakened.
…go for a drive?…
http://www.severestudios.com/cgi-bin/player-full.pl?username=brian.davidson&uid=609
It would be nice if my street looked like that one day this winter. Oh well…………………
LOOK! The Friday front is a BEAST!
National Weather Service Portland or
330 am PST Thursday Feb 21 2013
This beast of a cold front will be headed our direction…
And the funny thing is, this looks like a fairly average storm system for this time of year. It’s just that we are so action-starved for weather that it gets the moniker Beast. Maybe we should adopt the Weather Channel policy of naming storms. We can call this one….BEAST! We can call today’s front ACME, for example, and the one on Tuesday maybe CLIFF. Any other suggestions? FORK can be the 6th one. We need to stay in alphabetical order.
Uh oh, what will The Weather Channel say when they find out
NWS is naming storms too! yikes
And as regards the end of ‘Winter’ here-
At least Janucoma and Februcoma are fading from memory.
(pretty easy to forget, ‘nothing’)
Now, I look forward to Snowvember 2013.
CLIFF, might be a good name for the Tuesday event. We can make like a buncha Lemmings!
Lol
awesome mental image.
For M we will have to reserve the name MARK, W could be WISHCAST, L maybe LALALAND, Y can be YOU-IN, N can be NOSNOW, D for DOME. Next year, we will need to reserve B as BUST!!!
I think it’s always “unlikely” Portland sees snow.
Few things in the world of weather are always, but my thoughts were the same. It was already unlikely!
Mark needs to come up with an actual, official FOX12 Weather Fork and show it being lowered gradually on top of the FOX 12 studios this time each year. Kinda like the ball at New Years Eve in Times Square.
Nice!
There are OTHER reasons why February 20 serves as an excellent marking point between winter and spring, and in this note I go into several of them:
https://www.facebook.com/notes/karl-s-bonner/spring-is-here/10151421182692767
Note: ALWAYS keep in mind that Mother Nature’s seasonal cycle is a gradual and continuous process. Boundaries between Season X and Season Y are all arbitrary, and the astronomical definitions are simply attempts to “formalize” things with quantitative rigor. And weather and earth astronomy NEVER line up perfectly!
That’s an excellent posting Karl, very nice summary!
Thank you Mark – I’m glad you read it!
So, with winter receiving the fork, will we see 70 degrees anytime soon or even 65?
70 can’t be too sure about… but 65 definitely in early March.
Based on how we’ve received the shaft the last few years, I’d say mid to upper 50′s with rain and clouds. Hopefully we get some good convection to make it a little more bearable.
Well since that convection is still in the cold cored time period… I’d say possibly even a couple burritos too..
WRAPPED burritos! Hahaah!
wrapped HALF-EATEN burritos.
Booo, that sucks.
Here it comes folks. Mark sticking the forks in. Going on vacation next week. It’s the perfect storm. 8″ for everyone.
Ha-ha, classic! This is breaking news imho.
Mashed potatoes on the way…BIG time!
YAY!!! \^_^/