Dry days likely to continue

The weather headline is: Much warmer and drier than normal so far this month for Clark County. The monthly rainfall for the first three weeks of the month in Vancouver stood at 4.45 inches Saturday as we slipped below average for the month.

The last week of the month looks much drier than average, so unless we see a major change in the weather pattern, we’ll log yet another below-average rainfall month.

It appears, as I mentioned here, that we are going into a split flow weather pattern, with the bulk of the storms heading into California or British Columbia. We’ll just get the leftovers — mostly some cloudy periods and a low chance of any significant rainfall. The wet weather will penetrate all the way to southern California, which will cut the risk of fire.

A colder air mass will slip down the West Coast late in the week and could bring snow to the mountains around Los Angeles but none to our snow-starved mountains.

Interesting weather may appear sometime in the first week of December — maybe even a brush with Old Man Winter in the form of some freezing and very low snow levels — so, as always, stay tuned!

If you are traveling around the state for Thanksgiving, the highways should be OK, with possible icy patches over the passes and foggy patches in the valleys. We could get a dose of brisk easterly wind over the long holiday as well.