Weather, Climate, and Other Science Topics
We are finally starting to see some summer-like weather over the Pacific Northwest. I went for a nice bike ride on Sunday down to West Point in Discovery Park, and the weather was absolutely perfect, with highs touching 70 degrees at Sea-Tac and a mix of clouds and sun. Tons of riders were out on the Burke-Gilman […]
On Friday, my brother and I traveled up to Stevens Pass and had an amazing time skiing in the sunshine. Conditions were a little icy to begin, but after 11am or so, the south-facing slopes on the backside of the mountain softened up a bit and we were treated to some amazing spring-like skiing. It […]
Beginning around 1/14, a strong ridge of high pressure began to form over the Pacific Northwest, and although a few weak systems passing over it have brought a few sprinkles to Western Washington and Oregon at times, the weather is dead calm compared to the extreme mountain snow and river flooding we had to begin […]
When most Portlanders think of December, they think of Christmas trees, advent calendars, and cars with those big bows on them. Certainly not sunny skies, and much less 50+ degree temperatures to accompany them! But that’s exactly what we’ve seen to begin December. There was no measurable precipitation for the first 5 days of December […]
It’s been five days since my initial post, which, despite describing the most boring weather feature in existence, actually became my most-viewed post ever with over 1,000 views this week! That’s because Scott Sistek, a University of Washington meteorology grad who works for KOMO as a content writer/off-air meteorologist, was generous enough to share my […]
The title reads like an Onion article, but it’s true. A massive ridge of high pressure will move into western North America today and stay there for the foreseeable future, putting an abrupt end to our normally stormy weather. In the summer, such a ridge would give us extreme warmth, and this ridge will indeed […]
There’s a reason why very few people in the Pacific Northwest have air conditioning. For much of the summer, cool, marine air flows into Western Washington at night, keeping low temperatures in the 50s and preventing our residences from getting too hot. Of course, we have those periods in the summer when highs skyrocket into […]
Tuesday, February 9, 2016 11:37 am Right now, we have a pretty impressive inversion over our region. This was something I expected, and honestly, I was surprised that it was not stronger yesterday. It will weaken as the day goes on and the sun heats up the surface, but right now, it is quite striking. […]
Monday, February 8, 2016 4:59 p.m. We’ve seen our fair share of suffixes and nicknames for atmospheric and oceanic phenomena of all types these past two years. We had “The Blob,” a simple but very accurate designation given to a massive pool of warm water in the Northeast Pacific. We’re in the midst of the […]
Tuesday, December 1, 2015 10:15 pm Hey everybody. Sorry for being absent for over a week. It’s been a crazy past eight days here in Charlie-town, and when you add that to the extraordinarily boring weather we’ve had, you nearly almost always end up with a blog drought. Thankfully, the drought ends now, as the […]
