It is amazing how cold it has been in the early-morning hours without having a cold air mass over us.
One reason is the inversion with warmer air aloft, which traps the cold air at the surface, along with any pollutants. While we shivered in highs in the low to mid-40s, the mountains had temperatures in the 50s. Vancouver’s low Saturday was 22 degrees, the same as the first day of January.
That will change as a weak weather system makes its way inland later today. Cold air aloft will replace the warm air, and the air at lower levels will react to the colder air mass, unfortunately remaining in the 40s. At least the airshed will be cleaner.
Rainfall amounts don’t look that impressive through Tuesday, but anything helps, as the moisture at higher levels will be snow. The mountains desperately need some fresh powder to cover the dirty snow surfaces.
The not-so-good news is that we may dry out the rest of the week and could go back into an inversion. We’ll see.
The latest climate guidance came out Saturday, calling for drier-than-normal conditions and temperatures much warmer than normal for the Pacific Northwest. That was a change from earlier in the week, when it called for cooler and wetter weather. Maybe we should wait until Wednesday and see what the groundhog says.
With the cold front tonight, snow levels will drop, and snow will fall in our foothills down to 1,000 feet. Amboy, Yacolt, Livingston Mountain and other areas should see some of that white stuff falling.
Here at city levels, it will be a chilly rain, although one weather chart shows a chance of wet snow showers Tuesday or Wednesday in the lowlands. I think it will be too warm or little moisture, but who knows?
January’s rainfall stood at 4.59 inches here in Vancouver on Saturday, about a half-inch below average. Perhaps, if we are lucky, a quarter to a third of an inch will fall this week.
High pressure is forecast to move toward us later in the week, and the position of that high pressure will determine whether we stay dry and mild or perhaps get colder air from the northwest.
