Another winter tease Wednesday with clouds reaching Clark County, but snowfall remained south of Portland as forecast. Snow did fall, however, to unsuspecting places like Newport and North Bend on the Oregon Coast. Longtime Clark County resident and weather observer Dan Hein was camping at an RV park in North Bend and he reported 3.5 inches of fluffy snow. Locals said it was the most snow since 2008.
Skies cleared late Wednesday and will be sunny today and Friday before we begin our transition out of the freezing temperatures. With calmer winds tonight it will be the coldest, with temperatures down in the teens in most areas.
A low-pressure system then drops down from the Yukon on Friday night and will actually change the flow of the upper air pattern from northeast to north and then southwesterly. The moisture will arrive from the south from the circulation around this low. This means that snow, when moisture arrives, may be short-lived. It could begin as some light snow or sleet but the main threat of moisture over the weekend would be freezing rain. Just how long that lasts depends on the east winds, of course, and how fast the upper levels of the atmosphere warm.
So stay tuned to the latest forecasts as things could, and probably will, change. It will be a significant weather event. We could get 1 to 6 inches of snow then ice then rain. The fine details are not there as I write this column Wednesday afternoon. Remember snow forecasts can be a late-night call. Make plans to maybe stay inside on Saturday and Sunday. It looks like plain rain for next week and cool temperatures and tons of more snow in the mountains.
