Other than some cool showers the next few days not a whole lot of weather in the offing. Forecast models show a stronger storm with some good rains and mountain snows by Friday. The weekend looks cold and showery with very low snow levels. Any here at low-lying areas? I doubt it at this point but you never know, could be few wet flakes overnight or in the early morning hours. The last week of February is looking wetter, so stay tuned.
Vancouver hasn’t had much rain this month and won’t get a whole lot for a few days, but as the month winds down we could get closer to normal. As of 5 p.m. Monday we had only had .23 of an inch, about 2.5 inches below average. The average mean temperature was at 43.1 degrees, exactly average for the month.
We have only had six days at 32 degrees or below so far this month. The coolest was 26 degrees Feb. 8.
OK, a blast from the past. Just for fun, what was I writing about 20 years ago today? The following is an excerpt of my column for Feb. 18, 1993:
“Let it snow, let it snow, let it snow! And boy did it, all night long piling up between 2-4 inches around Vancouver as of 6 a.m. this morning. The strong east winds caused lots of blowing and drifting snow in east county where drifts up to one foot were reported. The cause for all of this? The first ingredient was the cold arctic air that settled in on Monday and continued the strong east winds all week. The second ingredient came all the way from California thanks to a large low pressure system spinning all week long off of the California coastline. The warmer moist air moved northward overriding the cold air locally and giving us a classic overrunning snow situation. What will happen next? After the moisture from the south rotates through today another storm system, this time dropping down from Canada, will increase the precipitation tonight and over the weekend with very low snow levels again.”
No repeat this year, guaranteed.
Patrick Timm is a local weather specialist. His column appears Tuesdays, Thursdays and Sundays. Reach him at Weather Systems.
