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News / Clark County News

Weather Eye: Week ahead looks wet in the lowlands, white on the mountains

The Columbian
Published: December 10, 2019, 6:00am

It appears the tide has changed and is no longer going out as our wet weather season is incoming. Some light rain today, increasing rain tomorrow and Thursday, and showery and cool Friday and the weekend. Snow levels drop Wednesday and give the ski areas some much need refreshing.

As the snow level drops later in the week down to 2,000 feet, and a good cold westerly flow of air comes off the ocean, I expect the ski areas to get 1 or 2 feet of new snow. Great news. As of Monday, Vancouver had .79 of an inch of rain so far this month, 1 inch below average. We won’t add much today but the next several days we may get to where we should be for mid-December.

So how long will this next wet spell last? At least through the weekend but some forecast models hint another dry spell reaches us next week. Let’s hope not and build that mountain snowpack. What are the odds of a white Christmas here in the lowlands this year? Well, quite small. Even at its best, the average is only a 5 percent chance.

However, this fall and winter so far have been unusual, to say the least, so a surprise short notice cold snap and the white stuff falling from the skies wouldn’t surprise me at all. Plenty of cold air to our north but it continues to plummet into the mid-United States.

Eight years ago, on this date in 2011, we were having clear and cold weather and school kids and many adults were hoping for a little snow. After all, if it is going to be freezing all day and all night why not? Our local weather observer Jim Knoll from the Orchards area sent me this bit of prose which was an original for sure. “The weather outside is clearing; and that is not endearing; so, let’s do the dance we know, and make it snow, make it snow, make it SNOW!”

Encore anyone?

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