Storms Out West– Who Gets Snow? Who Gets Rain? And Where’s the Sun?

It seems we just can’t catch a break!

For some skiers and riders this is heaven, but for most of us we just want to know when it’ll end.

The Next Storm

We can already see our next system knocking on the door. That’s that big blob of bright colors out over the Pacific.
The image shows water vapor in the middle levels of the atmosphere, and once again there is an abundance of it and it’s all coming ashore.

This time there are a couple differences we can see that are worth noting.

• It’s further to the North.
  Most of the moisture is moving ashore in the Northwest and Northern California.
• Strong southwesterly flow
  In the loop of the image (sorry you can’t see it), the flow is very strong southwest to northeast. This means places like Seattle and Portland will see rain instead of snow this go round!

A Typical Setup

The takeaway from the above section is simply; this is the storm we are all used to.

A bulk of the snow will fall in higher elevations than it has recently.
The snow levels will start at about 1,000 feet with the cold air in place, but once the warm front passes it will quickly rise to about 3,000 feet.

With the last storm that brought record snowfall to Seattle and portions of the I-5 corridor the abundance of moisture kept snow out of Portland, and that is exactly what will happen with this storm. The southwesterly flow will keep things mild, and as the mild Pacific air takes over we will see the snow level rise!

Just look at these maps! Folks in the rain side of things are looking at more than 3 inches! Mountains might need the yard stick when it comes to measuring this round of snow.

The End

Storm, blah blah blah, rain, blah blah blah, snow, yada yada yada!

At this point the only thing that matters is the sun!
And the good news is that some of you will see the sun as early as this weekend!

Portland, Seattle, and San Francisco are some of those places, so if you are looking to get out for a hike, Sunday might be your day!

Tomorrow I’ll be taking a closer look at which ski resorts will reap the benefits of this storm this weekend!

For WeatherNation — Meteorologist Jeremy LaGoo