A map showing how strong the El
Nino of 1997-1998 already was in late October 1997
I just came back from visiting Seattle with friends from Norway,
so I haven’t completed by “Mountain Forecast” page on my blog yet,
but tune in tomorrow and I’ll have it up and running!
My winter forecast will be released within the next couple
weeks, but so far I can say that this El Nino will not act like
your typical El Nino, with varying weather patterns reminiscent of
La Nina years AND El Nino years. This past October was one of the
wettest in recent memory with over 5” of precipitation over Western
Washington and close to 12” of rain in the foothills near North
Bend. Temperatures also averaged 0.5-1 degree below normal.
It isn’t very common for El Nino Octobers to feature the “cold
and wet” combonation. Typically we see cold and
dry or mild and dry. A couple El Nino years that
were cold and wet were 1951 and 1968, some of the coldest and
snowiest winters in Seattle history. Is that a sign of things to
come for this winter? I wouldn’t be so sure yet, but looking at
this past month and what we have in store for the first week or so
of this month, we will not be experiencing typical El Nino
weather.
Today was pleasant, but chilly with highs in the low 50s and
lows near freezing. Tomorrow will be very similar to today
with cold night in the 30s underway and a chilly afternoon
with highs in the low 50s once again.
Wednesday we’ll clear out and warm up quite a bit actually as we
have a little bit of offshore flow, helping boost the high
temperatures in the low to mid 60s! It’ll feel almost summery after
what we just went through! However the mild weather will be short
lived as a strong weather system will plow through the area
dropping rain and breezy conditions.
We turn that rain to showers Friday through the weekend before
another potentially significant rainmaker arrives for Monday.
Right about now, I’m sure a lot of you are wishing this El Nino
will kick into gear already! 😉
Matthew Leach
Forecasting Kitsap
Questions? Comments? E-mail me at: forecastingkitsap@live.com
7 DAY
FORECAST
