"Atmospheric River" To Flood Pacific Northwest In Coming Days

This map shows the atmospheric river potetial
later this weekend in the Pacific Northwest. The blue
and green hues hitting the region in this map
Sunday represent a corridor of moisture from the
tropics headed to British Columbia and Washington

It's inevitable that this would happen, as it occurs almost every winter along the West Coast.

An "atmospheric river" is taking aim at Washington State and neighboring coastal British Columbia later this weekend and maybe on into early next week. That almost always means at least some flooding.

I'll let NOAA define what an atmospheric river is for us:

"Atmospheric rivers are relatively long, narrow regions in the atmosphere - like rivers in the sky - that transport most of the water vapor outside of the tropics. These columns of vapor move with the weather, carrying an amount of water vapor roughly equivalent to the average flow of water at the mouth of the Mississippi River. When the atmospheric rivers make landfall, they often release this water vapor in the form of rain or snow."

As you can imagine, there's an absolute huge shitload of water that comes through the lower Mississippi River, so you can imagine that these atmospheric rivers can unleash an incredible amount of rain or snow.

The upcoming atmospheric river in Washington and British Columbia won't be at all extreme, certainly in comparison to some epic ones in the past.

Some of the nation's worst floods both in historic times and in recent years have been caused by atmospheric rivers.

In the winter of 1861-62, probably the worst and most persistent atmospheric rivers struck California. The firehose of water shifted a bit during the winter from southern to northern California and back again, but it just wouldn't quit.

Los Angeles got 66 inches of rain, four times its annual normal. Sacrameto remained submerged in ten feet or more of water for months. Telegraph poles in some areas were completely under water.  Nowadays, California has nearly 40 million people, so you can imagine what a mega-disaster we'd see if 1862 happened again.

Atmospheric rivers don't just hit the West Coast. They've caused immense flooding in Great Britain, for example. The Gulf of Mexico, Caribbean and Atlantic Ocean can trigger mean atmospheric rivers. An extreme Tennessee flood in 2010 was caused mostly by such a set up, for example. A catastrophic South Carolina flood in 2015 was in large part caused largely by at atmospheric river

I don't mean to be alarmist. Most atmospheric rivers aren't as destructive as the ones I just outlined. Not all atmospheric rivers are historic, and the one about to hit Washington State and British Columbia won't be the Worst Ever.

One saving grace is the atmospheric river will move, first hitting British Columbia then sinking south into Washington, so any one place won't have days of torrents.

Still, flooding is very likely in the western half of Washington State. The atmospheric rivers that come into the West Coast do have their origins in the tropics, as most of them do, so snow levels in the Cascades will rise quite a bit.

That means rain will fall at high elevations. There won't be that much snow to capture the water, and the atmospheric river will melt some of the snow in the high elevations. The combination of heavy rains and snowmelt will make the risk of flooding that much worse.

Sometimes, atmospheric rivers, once they're done with the West Coast, help spin up pretty intense storms in the central and eastern United States. This time, the atmospheric river in the Pacific Northwest might end up being one ingredient that could spin up a fairly strong storm in the eastern United States in about a week.

That scenario, though, is still quite uncertain.

Big Ocean Waves Shock And Awe The Pacific Northwest; Storminess Spreading Across U.S.

Crashing coastal waves in Oregon sent this big log
through a motel window. At least one person died
when he got too close to the big waves this past week. 

I've always wanted to take a vacation to the coastline in the Pacific Northwest during the winter.

People say I'm crazy for saying that. After all, the Pacific Northwest is a dark, rainy, stormy place for most of the winter.

Which is why I'd like to go there this time of year.  The immense waves from giant Pacific Storms that crash onto the rocks and sea stacks are a sight to behold. And, I imagine, a photographer's dream.

This week, the Pacific Northwest got a little more than they bargained for, as the waves were even more intense than they usually are. The crashing waves yesterday were bigger than locals have seen in many years.

While fascinated to watch, you've got to be careful, as these waves can get even bigger than you'd imagine. Tragically, a man was swept out to sea in Oregon by a wave yesterday and is presumed dead.

Elsewhere along coast, the high tides and waves were enough to flood shoreline roads and buildings. A seafood restaurant and a couple of motels in Lincoln City, Oregon had windows blown out and other damage, says OregonLive.com Waves also crashed into the ground floor of a condominium, sending a woman flying across a room.

Other people had close calls, too. A woman was injured when she was knocked over by a wave a Lincoln City, Beach. She was taken to the hospital with non-life threatening injuries. Another man and his dog were swept off a beach by a sneaker wave but the man and his dog were able to claw their way back onto shore.

In Cannon Beach,Oregon a popular go to place in winter storms for weather and photography enthusiasts like me, sea water pushed into town.

There's video of this at the bottom of this post. Also some of the storminess from the Pacific Northwest is consolidating into a storm that will cause problems in much of the United States. And it will affect us here in Vermont, too.

My in-laws in Yankton, South Dakota yesterday enjoyed a mid-winter heat wave that set temperatures all the way up to 61 degrees as warm air bathed the central Plains. I hope they enjoyed it, because Yankton and a large section of the Plains is now in the path of a new winter storm.

Winter storm warnings as of this morning extended through the central Rockies into most of Nebraska and parts of South Dakota. Winter storm watches extended from South Dakota into Minneasota. Looks like there will be quite a bit of snow and wind in this band Sunday and Monday.

Since this storm will go by to the west of New England, we Vermonters are in for another spell of mixed precipitation and rain. It'll start as snow and a mix Monday night. It looks at this point like it'll be mostly rain Tuesday, before colder air comes in at night to create some snow showers Tuesday night and Wednesday.

It won't be nearly as warm, and it won't rain nearly as hard as it did a week ago Friday, when we had flooding and ice jams. This storm probably won't cause new problems in that regard, but ice jams remain in Vermont and other sections of the Northeast.

The thawing and rain could aggravate those situations and maybe cause new flooding or ice movements, so keep an eye on that one, will ya?

Now the Pacific Northwest videos

Here's an aerial view of the tides coming up onto a road in Ocean Park, Washington, forcing motorists to scramble to get out of the way:

Midwest Ice Storm To Become New England Messy Storm

A tornado crosses a highway northwest of Houston, Texas
Monday morning. Although the Northeast is
in for a vareity of messy, wintry weather today
and tomorrow, at least there will be no tornadeos
in the region. You take what you can get. 

Freezing rain and other yucky mixed precipitation was moving into the Northeast today from that icy storm that battered and bothered the middle of the country over the past few days.

That storm even produced severe weather and tornadoes in Texas. I guess the good news is no tornadoes will happen with the Northeast storm today, which is always a good thing.

Meanwhile, beleaguered Portland, Oregon is about to get another icy storm and most of the West Coast is getting a new round of stormy weather, too.

More on that in a moment.

First, let's get the more eastern storm explanation out of the way:

NORTHEAST

A freezing rain advisory is in effect today for most of the northern half of Pennsylvania and the southern half of New York State outside the New York City metro area today as that icy storm from the Midwest moves on through.

Once you get to New England, including Vermont, things get more complicated, and potentially messier, as a secondary storm gets going along the coast.

Had that storm from the Midwest just zoomed up through the Great Lakes without that second storm forming precipiation would change to rain and there wouldn't be much ice or snow accumulation.

But as that new storm forms along the coast, the winds will shift to the north in New England. When the wind shifts and how strongly it does so will determine precipitation types throughout the region.

It's going to be a close call between snow, sleet, a little freezing rain and rain in any given area, since temperatures are going to be marginal through this thing.

A Northeast snow accumulation forecast map.
Areas in yellow and orange would get three to
eight inches of snow. 

As a result, count on current forecasts in at least parts of the region to be wrong. Just generally expect messy weather, and don't hang your hat too much on precise predicted snow and sleet accumulations.

That said, it looks like southern and central New Hampshire, and southern Maine away from the coast are in for the most trouble. That area is under a winter storm warning tonight and much of Wednesday for four to seven inches of wet, heavy snow, possibly mixed with sleet or rain.

Here in Vermont, all but the far northern reaches of the state are under a winter weather advisory for an expected three to five inches of dense, wet snow, mixed with a little ice.  South and east facing slopes of the central and southern Green Mountains might get a little more than that.

That amount of snow is not totally huge by Vermont standards, but shoveling it off your driveway will feel like shoveling wet cement out of the way.

The advisory is in effect from late this afternoon through Wednesday morning in Vermont.

The northern Champlain Valley and far northern Vermont will get less, probably close to two to four inches of yucky stuff.

Count on a sloppy Wednesday morning commute, I'll say that.

After the storm tapers off Wednesday, we'll continue with a long spell of fairly warm weather throught the weekend. A good portion of the new snow and slush, especially in the valleys, will have melted as we're getting into another January thaw.

WEST COAST:

Portland, Oregon is in trouble with the weather again during their remarkably rough winter of snow, ice and cold.

Another ice storm is going to happen there today, as cold air hangs tough while a strong Pacific Ocean storm rolls in.

Some areas near the Columbia  Gorge could get an inch of ice accumulation, which would be pretty destrucitve. But areas that get much less will have nearly impassable roads for awhile today and tonight, especially since snow and ice lingers from the last storm.

Today's ice isn't the end of the 'West Coast problems, either.

High winds will batter coastal locations. Worse, as this storm moves in, it'll bring in a huge slug of moisture and dramatically warmer temperatures starting tomorrow.

The rain and snowmelt will almost surely cause flooding in Oregon and parts of Washington and northern California.

Big portions of Washington State face ice storm and winter storm warnings with this storm. Avalanche warnings are also up for the Cascade Mountains.

We'll provide updates on this storm and will watch its progress, too, because the Pacific Northwest storm will spin off other storm systems, some possible strong, for other areas of the nation next week.

Rare, Damaging Tornadoes Sweep Oregon Coast; New Big Storm Still Coming

Aftermath of a destructive tornado in coastal
Manzanita, Oregon on Friday.  

Coastal Oregon suffered the very rare spectacle of damaging tornadoes on Friday.

The hardest hit town was the coastal town of Manzanita, where the tornado damaged homes, ripped down trees and cut power.  

You can see a video of the tornado taken from a nearby hillside at the bottom of this post.

The Manzanita tornado was among the most destructive in Oregon history, says television station KATU in Portland, Oregon. 

In Manzanita, one home and two businesses were destroyed. At least 128 other homes were damaged in the EF2 twister, which packed winds of between 125 and 130 mph.

Tornadoes happen from time to time in Oregon, but their rarely this strong. KATU reports that there have been 106 tornadoes in Oregon since 1950, but only four were rated EF2 or higher. The rest were weaker.

Another tornado touched down in Oceanside, Oregon Friday, but that one caused little if any damage.

The Oregon twisters were part of an intense series of storms hitting the Pacific Northwest this weekend. Elsewhere in the Northwest, strong winds downed power lines and some rivers went into flood as a strong storm crashed ashore Friday.

The worst might be yet to come. Though chances of more tornadoes are relatively slight, another strong storm will hit the Pacific Northwest today. It's energized by the remnants of Typhoon Songda.

Fears have subsided that this would be as bad as the epic, destructive storm of 1962, widespread damaging winds are likely today in Oregon and Washington. Even in relatively protected Seattle, winds could gust to 65 mph late this afternoon and evening.

There Could Be An Incredibly Bad Storm In The Pacific Northwest This Evening

A steeple on Campbell Hall at the Oregon College of Education
in Monmouth blows down amid hurricane force
 winds during the famous Columbus Day storm of 1962.
There's a chance of a similar storm in the Pacific
Northwest this weekend. 

The Pacific Northwest is used to big rainy, windy storms roaring in off the Pacific Ocean.

But there's a risk that a storm this weekend could be one for the record books. It all depends on where the storm goes.

The region is off to a start today, with one strong storm coming in. High wind warnings are up for much of Washington and Oregon, and several inches of rain could fall with this one. Some flooding is possible.

While today's storm is really big, especially for this early in the season, it's not a record breaker. There will be power failures and local flooding, but they'll get over it.

On Saturday, there's a risk of a much, MUCH bigger storm, powered by the remnants of Typhoon Songda.

The National Weather  Service in Seattle says there's roughly a one in three chance this Saturday storm will be extreme in Washington and Oregon.

If it plows onshore in Washington, expect a historic storm something like the Columbus Day Storm of 1962, which was spawned by similar weather conditions as those now over the Pacific, notes the Seattle Times.

In 1962, a storm powered by the remains of Typhoon Freda slammed into the Pacific Northwest, killing 46 people and causing extreme wind damage. Winds during that storm gusted to an estimated 150 mph in spots, or even 180 mph at the coast, but it's hard to know since so many wind measuring sites were damagted.

There's a good video summary of the 1962 storm, with some dramatic footage, at the bottom of this post.

Of course, the National Weather Service in Seattle, thankfully says there's a better chance, maybe two in three, that the storm will curve northward, way off shore.

That would mean the Northwest has a very stormy, windy weekend with some power failures and flooding, but again, it would be something they're used to. Still, some computer models are unloading one to two feet of rain on coastal Pacific Northwest, and up to seven inches of rain in Idaho.

You can see why they're worried about flooding.

Parts of British Columbia, Canada are under the gun with this stormy weather, too.

Here's that video of the 1962 storm:

As Hurricanes Miss, Pacific Northwest Gets A Big Wind Blast

One of many fallen trees in Vancouver, British Columbia
Canada after a wicked weekemd wnd storm  

Tropical Storm Erika fizzled, Hurricane Fred is way out over the eastern Atlantic, so it looks like the United States is escaping a hurricane, at least for now.

(Though Hurricane Ignacio is going to cause tropical storm conditions in Hawaii.)  

However, the Pacific Northwest in the United States and British Columbia on the west coast of Canada got a hurricane force blow over the weekend from a regular, albeit powerful storm that came ashore.

Winds gusted to 90 mph in Oceanside, Oregon and 85 mph in Nasalle Ridge, Washington.

These kinds of strong storms with wind gusts to hurricane force affect the Pacific Northwest and British Columbia from time to time in the winter.

But it's very rare to get something like this in the summer. There's still leaves on the trees, and in wind storms, the leaves act like a multitude of little sails. The leafy "sails" pull the trees in the wind much more than if they were bare, so more trees than usual toppled in the weekend storm.

Falling trees killed two people in Washington State, and 450,000 or so of the state's residents lost their electricity.

In British Columbia, at least 400,000 homes and businesses were left without electricity. Parks and other outdoor activities were shut down Saturday over fears that trees would fall on people.

The storm has moved on and things have calmed down in the region. With drier air moving in, the wildfires, though, will continue.

Here are some weekend scenes from Vancouver, British Columbia:

Erika Struggles, So Does Pacific Northwest With Wind, Fires, Smoke

Rain forecast for the Pacific Northwest will tamp down
some wildfires, but strong winds inland this weekend
could make things worse.  

All weather eyes have been on what Tropical Storm Erika is up to as it relates to Florida, but the real weather trouble in the nation currently is in the Pacific Northwest.

Things will get dicier and weirder there over the next couple days, but first let's do a quick update on Erika. 


STILL MAYBE FLORIDA BOUND, BUT.....

Tropical Storm Erika was still struggling in the Caribbean this morning, battling strong upper level winds and interactions with land.

As suggested yesterday, the track of the storm is a little south and west of earlier predictions. That's making the already badly disorganized Erika struggle to maintain its identity as a tropical storm.

There's even a chance it could dissipate today.

If it survives, Erika is still expected to emerge over warm waters and lighter upper level winds south of Florida.

The predicted track of the storm seems to be much further west, and weaker than originally thought.

Instead of being near the Florida east coast, it now is forecast to head up toward western Florida. Maybe even more west than that. Current projections take it northward up the Florida pennisula as a tropical storm.

Which may actually be good news for South Florida, which is in a drought and needs the rain. If the track verifies, it's less likely Erika will become a full-fledged hurricane, because of interactions with land.

Forecasts for this storm keep shifting, so it's worth it to keep an eye out for Erika. I've outlined the current forecast thinking from the National Hurricane Center, but I still think there will be further changes to the forecast:

PACIFIC NORTHWEST FIRES, STORM

It's good news/bad news in terms of the ongoing fires in the Pacific Northwest, but since the weather there is about to turn more extreme, all in all I think it's mostly bad news, unfortunately.

A strong storm is expected to come ashore in that region over the next few days. It's unusually powerful for so early in the season. Usually you get stronger storms like this later in the fall and winter.

The good news is, it's going to rain up that way. Especially in the Cascades, where even the rain forests caught fire this summer it's been so dry. The National Weather Service in Portland, Oregon says this will be the region's biggest rainstorm since March.

This won't completely solve the fire problem in the Cascades, but a good one to four inches of rain isn't going to hurt.  The fires in the western halves of Washington and Oregon there will be tamped down because of this for at least a week or two, if not more.

The problem is many of the fires are inland, in central and eastern Washington, Oregon, and on into Idaho and Montana.

There won't be much rain with this storm there. But the storm is going to carry powerful winds. True, the humidity and clouds will be up, but the wind will make the fires awfully erratic.

Plus, we're talking VERY strong winds. High wind watches are flying for Saturday for gusts to 60 mph. Maybe even 70 to 80 mph in mountain passes. Talk about spreading fires!

In parts of drier Idaho and Montana, fire weather watches are up Saturday because of the gusty winds.

The western wildfire nightmare of 2015 is far from over, that's clear.

What's With The Dirty Rain In the Pacific Northwest?

Dirty rainwater in a rain gauge in eastern Washington
State today. Officials are trying to determine it its volcanic ash
or dirt from dusty fields in the water.  

That it's been raining for the past few days in the Pacific Northwest of the United States is hardly news.

It seemingly always rains this time of year up in that neck of the woods. It's the winter rainy season there, and boy does it rain.

The news today is that in northeastern Oregon and southeastern Washington, some of the rain is not that clear refreshing water you get with a Pacific rainstorm.

Instead, the water coming out of the sky has been kind of dirty, milky, grungy, says KOMO-TV.

Nobody is quite sure what made the rain so dirty.

It could be ash that got sucked up into the clouds from Volcano Shiveluch in Russia. Ingredients for the storm passed over the volcano, so that can make sense. A little bit of ash from that volcano found its way to the Pacific Northwest even before the latest series of storms arrived.

Stuff in the air can go long distances. My dad, now 94, remembers brown snow falling in Vermont in the 1930s. It turns out the snow was laced with dust picked up by strong winds on the Great Plains during the Dust Bowl era.

It's been awfully windy in Washington and Oregon, and some of the strong winds hit in relatively dry eastern parts of those states before the rain started. Dust from scrub and agricultural land in the area could have been drawn up by the winds in the area.

There were also lots of forest fires in the region last summer, so ash from the remnants of the fires might have gotten into the clouds.

The National Weather Service in Spokane, Washington said it will look into it further for more definite answers.

NWS in Spokane noted the cloudy, dirty rainwater on its Facebook page. It's inevitable anytime something odd pops up on social media, you get even more odd conspiracy theories, and this is no exception.

Many people on that NWS Facebook page are saying it's chemtrails, that widely discredited but wildly popular conspiracy theories that say those contrails the thin ribbons of white clouds coming from the tails of jets - is some crazy government plot to control our minds, poison us, control the weather, or something.

The "chemtrails" are actually contrails, hot exhaust from jets going into the cold air, It makes moisture in the air condense into streamers of ice crystals, and that's what you see.

I have to say some of the comments are pretty over the top, like this one:

"Well, whatever it is, you can bet the U.S. weather service will be complicit in hiding the truth. No such thing as meteorologists in the U.S. anymore. This is just a drop in the bucket of the results of geoengineering. Stop lying to Americans, ad realize your families are being made sick and will die because of the crap they are dumping on us. We have no media anymore, just over priced talking heads. Sad, that America has come to this."

No, it's sad that America has come to the point that any odd or unusual phenomenon makes people actually believe the government is trying to kill the populace with weird science, because, I don't know, the government thinks randomly killing the population of the U.S. is fun!

Yes, the government is capable of doing bad, ugly things, but Come On!

I'm glad somebody else responded on the NWS Facebook page: "Can't wait for the sample to come back as volcano ash and you idiots will start the 'weatherman are shills' bullshit."

Oh, yes, I can guarantee that will happen.

But in the meantime it will be interesting to see whether the volcanic ash or dust theories are correct.