7pm Tuesday…
Way back in October when we talked about the strong El Niño affecting our winter weather, the main message was “mild”. Possibly drier than normal too. The first part has panned out, but we’ve been wetter than normal so far. I also had a feeling that brief cold blast in mid-January would be a one-hit wonder and sure enough that appears to be the case. It has barely felt like winter the last 2 weeks or so and I don’t see any low elevation snow or arctic air through the 15th-20th of this month. Yes, it CAN snow after Valentine’s Day in the lowest elevations, we all know that. But it becomes far more rare after that time…especially in El Niño winters.
First a few thoughts…
KEY POINTS
- There’s no sign of a weather pattern that would produce low elevation snow or bring cold arctic air south out of Canada for at least the next two weeks. We are “safe” from that through at least the 20th of this month.
- I am taking my snow tires off for now since my son/I can quickly do that on our cars. If it were getting done at a tire shop for $$$? I’d leave them on a few more weeks just in case…
- There is no sign of a real “storm” of any sort in the next 7+ days in NW Oregon and SW Washington. By that I mean no strong south wind, heavy/flooding rains. That’s our typical mild stormy weather. Instead several very weak systems that bring occasional bouts of very light rain or showers.
- 2-3 weeks of warm weather and rain at times in the Cascades has dropped the snowpack to below normal in Oregon and well below in Washington. That big 9 day dumping of snow was a one-hit wonder as well…but it was glorious!
I know within two weeks you may be asking…was that it for winter? That’s possible…more on what we have seen in late winter during these El Niño events below. Take a look at temperatures the last 30 days in Portland. This really shows how mild it has been the last 2+ weeks with most nights in the 40s and days in the 50s…not exactly harsh winter weather. Last weekend was amazing with lots of sunshine and temperatures 5-15 degrees above normal both afternoons.
This has taken a real toll on the snowpack in our mountains; remember it was going above average 2-3 weeks ago? Here’s Oregon right now
And Washington is well-below normal; could be looking at water issues up there unless spring is much wetter
Model forecasts are not showing a big snowy pattern either. The ECMWF model ensemble forecast says less than 20″ in the next two weeks up there. Each of those thin lines is one of 50 ensemble members, the highlighted (with yellow) green line is the ensemble average.
This stagnant pattern has resulted in the worst “east wind season” in the Portland metro area since at least 2007. So many days with high pressure east of the Cascades and not many mild southerly wind episodes to wipe out the cool air over there. Right now we’re sitting at the highest number of 25+ gust days at Troutdale Nov-Jan since 2007. Keep in mind this chart shows November all the way through the end of February, so we’ll see how many east wind days we end up with this month.
El Niño winters in the Pacific Northwest often see long periods of split-flow which means the jet stream isn’t as consolidated as normal. The subtropical jet is often much stronger than normal in these winters to our south as well, leaving most weather action down there. Wow…that’s sure the case right now with flooding and damaging wind in California the last 3 days. Look at the jet stream outlook the next 15 days from the ECMWF model ensemble control run. Up around 30,000-35,000′. This takes us through the 21st. Notice the strong jet stream across southern USA and northern Mexico. We don’t get significant storms way up here as long as this setup continues
Another way to look at the expected pattern is up around 18,000′, check out the 500mb anomaly for the next 5 days from GFS ensemble average. Above average heights just offshore and troughing going back to our south. Weak systems come down from the northwest so we’ll get cooler temps for a few days and snow as low as 1,500′ in the foothills and Coast Range…but not a ton.
Then days 5-10 includes most of “Valentine’s Week”, ridging takes over. This is a drier than normal pattern and relatively mild too.
The days 10-15, which takes us to the 21st, ridging is weaker and we could turn a bit wetter. But the big cool/negative anomalies are down in California. Could turn stormy down there again.
The ECMWF precipitation forecast from the ensemble control run for the 14th-21st looks too dry to me, but the point is we can expect drier than normal conditions for the next 1-2 weeks across the region.
Since I was curious, I checked all 9 strong El Niño winters since 1950. What happened in the lowlands in February and March? Wow, the trend is clear, we tend to have warmer than normal temperatures in these years, especially in February. There has not been a single “cold” late winter during a strong El Niño event in our area.
The lack of late season snow didn’t surprise me though…in many of these El Niño winters late winter just kind of morphs into a cool/wet early spring with no low elevation snowfall. Out of those 18 months (9 years February & March), only ONE month saw measurable snow at PDX…that was March 1966. So I’m saying there’s a chance…but a very small chance. Most of our late season lowland snowfalls occur in La Niña years, not strong El Niño winters! And Government Camp snowfall has been below normal in MOST years too.
Alright, that’s it for this evening. The main message is that slow weather continues for another 1-2 weeks; not all dry, but not too wet either.
FOX 12 Weather Blog 
If the weather models are correct the first half of March could be record cold. This time of year it means highs of 40-45. So no Arctic blasts, rather a continuous Northwesterly flow with snow down to 1K feet at times. Very La Nina like. This will be good for the mountains but little else. Still meteorological Spring is but two days away. The last time I saw a pattern like this was 1971 when I was 17. And given global warming I expect another hot Summer. Live baseball is on tv and 7:15 sunsets are less than two weeks away so I don’t mind too much. As for those who’s only reason for being on this blog seems to be to annoym I just ignore them. In the meantime enjoy the exciting weather. Peace.
👍👍
BTW: There’s a weather blog from Kentucky (Louiseville) that looks JUST like Mark’s blog and started around the same time too, They too are complaining about their blog being ‘dead’ for a number of years and for the same reasons. Low effort posts and joke users:
Serious weather posts don’t get allowed about actual detailed weather and only joke posts happen about Model XYZ.
In that case the serious/hard core users that don’t just look at weather models X-Z they don’t want to deal with poo poo coming out of people’s mouths either online OR offline.
It’s not worth their time and I’ve come to realized it’s not worth mine either.
I wouldn’t mind ‘joke posts’ if the jokes were any good. To be honest, it’s hard to imagine a group with less of a sense of humor than weather weenies.
BTW: If you don’t want a political answer don’t ask political questions simple as that:
Wolves these days are sadly a highly political topic because of what (some) states have done . It doesn’t have to be that way. That’s it no more political stuff. If you want answers your on your own!
TL/DR: User asks something that is very political: Gets upset when a political answer is given then runs off crying about it. Can’t get anymore insane then that! 🙃 As I said that’s my last political answer I’ll give to a political question. Next time kiddos your on your own. Don’t bite the hand that feeds ya!
That’s the only ‘political’ post I will make because Silver Falls asked but I guess he wasn’t really serious about the question then. He needs to be careful what he asks if he doesn’t like the answer same with anybody. I also learned that the hard way too in other areas.
I guess this confirms what I said a while back, that you and Kyle are the same person. Interesting that you switch back and forth between the two. I hope you’re taking your meds man.
I’ll say it one more time. Don’t want political answers don’t ask political questions. Simple as that. Yes I am the same person because of being censored and I learned to not answer people’s political crap that comes out of their mouth.
Get back on the meds, yigablademaster.
To answer Silver Falls question about more wolverine sightings in case he reads on this blog too. It’s because your type voted in asinine laws that prevent home owners from defending their livestocks to ‘save the wolf population’ from going extinct. You saved it all right!
This is the irony many of us feared, the wolves being more and more brazen which if you shoot your gun to ward it off your property (without injury) your still liable now, so as a home owner your hands are tied and held hostage by yours truly. Thanks voters of Oregon! You did a WONDERFUL job. To quote Stan Freberg “Wonderful Wonderful”
Currently 33’1
My deck turned to white with the last snow shower. Low so far this evening has been 32.7.
It’s actually amazing a place as small as Redding is has such a varied climate. The east side is almost desert like while the west is 2 to 3X wetter. The old fire station used to have weather observation and it’s quite clear how wet it was on that part of town a few hundred feet up in elevation. Even MUCH wetter in the extreme west part and Shasta Dam/Lake.
we had a nice dusting up here overnight… still hanging around in the cold
This post is so old it’s eligible for social security!!
I wonder why Mark doesn’t transfer his most recent blog posts to this legacy site more often. Must be really difficult and time-consuming to do it, since it only happens about once a month anymore.
When you either A: censor a blog to death or
B: make it so only ‘joke’ posts are allowed even if there is no actual censoring involved both are failed models and will lose followers as they catch on.
It’s like a house built upon the sand when the ‘storm’ comes your house will collapse but the smart one built his house on sturdy rocks and the storm pounded and pounded but the house stood.
A house divided against itself will fail no matter what and no amount of modern theology can fix that. It’s been that way since Adam and Eve or (the beginning of time) depending on how you go.
Looks rather chilly the next two weeks, but nothing too much out of the ordinary. Maybe a bit like late February early March of 1971. 53 and mostly cloudy at present. Peace.
What went on in 1971, Dan?
I don’t know what happened at Dan’s location in 1971, but up here in southern BC (Vancouver) we had a pretty substantial snowfall and cold spell in late February 1971 and into the start of March.
No duh! That’s up in Vancouver a way different climate then Oregon both then and now. People seem to forget that.
No it’s not “a way different climate”. Check your high school Geography textbook, we’re all in a CFB climate in the Pacific North- west. There may be some variation due to latitude and terrain, but it’s usually similar.
No it is a different climate. Often the ‘jet stream’ which is something that used to be talked about now is often aimed in that direction where Oregon/Northern California (until the last winter or so) was getting skunked. Don’t know if it’s a climate thing or a local issue that’s stuck thing.
In late February of 1971 we had very low snow levels. Several inches of snow fell though the afternoon high reached the mid to upper 30,s. The Koin tv tower collapsed as did the roof of the South Salem K-Mart. Then the skies cleared out and the low in Salem was 12. The coldest ever that lat in the Season. Peace.
850s and surface temps coming down on the Euro for later next week. Something to watch…
Personally I’m over it and ready for Spring, but I suppose we’re still technically in meteorological Winter for a little bit longer.
Maybe some wet snow down to 800 feet Monday night or Tuesday morning. Not the valley floor but possibly some of the higher hills. Also we might eke out a 60 or two later this week. Next week we should get 2-3 feet of snow in the mountains where it belongs. Weather worth commenting on. Peace.
ECMWF says otherwise. Well over 2-3 feet in the mountains, and some snow down to valley floor. Looks like about 5″ where I am in Portland.
Hmm, how would that happen? Daytime highs will be in the 40s, 850 temp get to about -7 for a very short amount of time, and 3 hour QPF for that window is only .2in. KPTV thinks it will be mostly a 1000’+ event, which seems likely based on the info we have.
Most of the snow being shown was towards the end of the run on YESTERDAYS 12z ecmwf. It was 32-34 degree snow with -6 850 temps. Monday night will probably result in no snow, but later on in the week could have snow if we’re lucky. Especially if it trends a couple of degrees colder.
12z EPS had quite a few members with snow. Obviously this is 10:1 ratio so take it with a grain of salt, much of this event will probably be 5-8 snow ratio IF we end up getting snow. I do not think it will snow but it’s pretty silly to be as confident as you are that it isn’t going to snow, when there is a very real threat of snow.
Being skeptical of surface-level snow at this time of year is a pretty healthy outlook, especially when the local mets are singing that tune. We’re also more than 3 days out and that’s always been unreliable with these types of scenarios.
Weather Dan wants his Redding dream come true. I personally think he needs to either visit or move there. Redding has plenty of microclimates to choose from.
Mild /dry Februarys often turn into Cool,cloudy rainy Marches- so I’m thinking that could happen this year.
It’s nice to see us picking up a few inches of snow daily in the mountains. No need for monster storms that impact us negatively in the valley. We are rebuilding our mountain snow while down here in the valley the weather is mild. May this trend continue. 45 and partly sunny in Salem currently. Peace.
Another thing. While I’m still curious as to why it’s much warmer then forecast the few OR posters aren’t posting like they do. The OR posters especially the Eugene guys usually post a few times a night especially when an event is underway as I love seeing what’s going on ‘down under’ in their neck of the woods.
TL/DR: I hope they didn’t all get blocked in order to make it look like it’s snowing hard everywhere.
ah the great conspiracy!
If it wasn’t happening multiple times I wouldn’t have even noticed but due to our late winter events in recent years I’m definitely noticing.
Almost 50F and feels very warm with a S wind outside. I think OR posters are being blocked on The Weather Forums from telling the truth. The Eugene Guy said it reached 50F today though it was hugging in the low 40s here until mid evening’s warm surge. WTF happened to the forecast? Why did this bust?
snow in camas…500′
Snowing at about 1000’ in the west hills. Not sticking of course. Mixy down to about 550’-600’
Sounds like the National Weather Service is thinking sticking snow is a possibility for tonight and tomorrow in the Portland area. They just issued a winter weather advisory for the area. Mark?
Nice sunny day here- tomorrow should be mainly cloudy but remaining dry, and I don’t see much in the way of significant precipitation amounts in the coming days.
Portland NWS afternoon discussion mentioned the chances of snow tommorow and Thursday night. TLDR of it is, this event has many similarities to the famous Jan 10th 2017 snowstorm, which gave Portland a foot of snow. The chances of all of the right ingredients mixing together to make the snowstorm that time was about 10%, and they think the probabilities are similar this time.
“Then there is the potential worst case scenario for Wednesday night through Thursday night where the lowlands receive much more snow than 1 inch. This could happen in two ways: the advance of the cold air is actually stronger than presently forecast, or the incoming surface low stalls offshore with the surface front over the area, allowing for heavier rainfall rates than expected that would lower snow levels significantly. The 12z HREF shows a 20% probability of both at least 1 inch and 6 inches of snow down to the valley floor in the Portland/Vancouver metro region through 4 am Thursday (as far out as this this run forecasts for). Additionally, about 5-10% of GEFS/EC ensemble members (mainly GEFS) feature extreme snow accumulations of 6-12 inches by late Thursday night, though notably no Canadian ensemble members feature any snow at all, not even a trace. To provide some perspective, there are indeed some similarities between this event and the unexpected Jan 2017 snow event where much of the PDX metro saw nearly a foot of snow. That event was heavily precip intensity driven, with the thermal profile going isothermal near 0 deg C in the low levels due to heavy precip and the latent heat processes of melting and evaporation cooling the environment. That could happen with this event, but the odds are low just as they were in that case. In that event, there was probably about a 10% chance of all the
ingredients to come together for a snowstorm, and they did. Probabilities are similar for this Wednesday night through Thursday night event having everything come together just right for heavy metro lowland snow. IMPORTANT: A 10 percent chance of something happening means it should not happen 9 out of 10 times. It is highly likely that the more benign cold rain scenario will play out and NOT the snowstorm scenario. Also, it is important to note that road temperatures are warm, generally in the upper 30s to low 40s, since temperatures in the lowlands have been above freezing for weeks. This will limit the amount of lighter snow that can accumulate on roadways as most of it will melt shortly after impact. However, if a scenario where heavy precipitation rates cause lower snow levels and more snowfall in a short period of time, then there is higher potential of snow accumulating on roadways.”
We should pay close attention to this event, as we could get a large snowstorm.
They just posted this image https://i.ibb.co/XVQwHgp/FB-IMG-1707870652216-thumb-jpg-eb2f0608f60a8573aa1113e949597d28.jpg
hopefully the image works this time, didn’t work on the last comment
https://i0.wp.com/i.makeagif.com/media/12-30-2018/6DyG6t.gif
32 and foggy this morning. 43 and cloudy currently. What a boring month of weather so far. 6:00PM sunset in 17 days. 7:12PM sunset in 26 days. Outstanding. Peace.
6:48AM sunrise in 17 days, 7:32AM sunrise in 26 days in your town, Salem. Because of daylights savings time happening soon, it’s silly to just say sunset times, or just say sunrise times. Proper way to put it is, 11 hour and 12 minutes of daylight in 17 days, 11 hours and 40 minutes of daylight in 26 days. Still an impressive difference, but there’s no reason to exaggerate it.
I think the first day of daylights savings time should be somewhere between March 25th and early April, March 10th is too early for it. A sunrise after 7:00AM is far more inconvenient for many people, than a sunset before 7PM.
This most recent system brought some much appreciated snow to the local mountains. Down here I had about 1.35 inches of rain from it- mostly yesterday. Skies have cleared out now and it’s a beautiful afternoon.
Cooler weather ahead? Maybe cooler, but not cold. Still by next Friday we might struggle to get out of the low 40,s .The coldest since mid January. Fascinating. Peace.
February is often a rather dry month here in the PNW. I expect this February will be one of those, but not as dry as February 1993- that one turned out to be my second driest month of the year.
I wonder what the next extreme weather event will be. Since 2020 we have had many. The East wind and forest fires in September. The severe ice storm in February of 2021. The heat dome in June of 2021. The week of record heat in late July of 2022. The record warm October of 2022. The incredibly hot Summer of 2023 and the devastating wind and ice storm last month. Whatever the event I suspect it will happen within the next 6 months. Peace.
If anything, hopefully that means we’re finally due for a normal summer. I think very hot summers and fire smoke are the new normal though.
What’s scary to think of is how September 2020 and June 2021 occurred during seasonal transition times, giving us an opportunity to “breathe” in a relatively short amount of time. Imagine having either of those events occur mid-July: I think that’s the next extreme weather event we should be worried about. That $h!7 could linger for 1-3 months if the timing hits right and it would be truly miserable.
No…
The June event we got in 2021, was at the best possible timing for heat, highest sun angle, longest daylight, which all contributed towards the extreme heat. Setups like that almost NEVER happen in June, which is why we aren’t used to it, but when they do happen, it is the hottest setup we can get. If it had happened in mid July, it would have been at least a few degrees cooler.
Yes, but June in Oregon is a dynamic month. It can be hot and dry, or mild and wet. It’s more susceptible to breaking a particular pattern. July and August, not so much anymore. Those two months are pretty much guaranteed to be toasty with heat and smoke establishing itself for much longer.
Also, recall that we still reached 108F in August last year despite the sun angle and daylight duration.
Under a hypothetical scenario, 3 days at 115F in June is much better than potentially weeks of 108+ under our typically stagnant hot and dry pattern in July/August.
To West Linn: most people fail to input the lack of marine moderation or ‘ocean layer’ expecting to be whatever it has been for the last 100 years. Those rules don’t play anymore for various reasons.
You need data from 1100AD to 1200AD. If we can ever ‘find’ that data we can have a lot more reliable forecasting system. He he he. Good luck.
Hi Kyle. I’ve suspected you were operating as “X” for a while now. Am I correct? Doesn’t matter either way, just curious if that was an accurate assumption.
I think I agree though, those “rules” don’t play the same anymore as evidenced by the topic at hand (more extreme weather in recent years).
Two days ago the weather forecast for today was of periods of rain here,(in Vancouver BC) possibly mixed with snow. This morning, skies have cleared out and no precipitation occurred overnight. Quite the forecast bust.
I think you were trying to review on Google and took a wrong turn? have seen those weird blank comments on Google Reviews more often often older ones.