The infrared satellite was startled this afternoon
Extremely cold air has spread out of Alaska, across the Gulf of Alaska and the northeastern Pacific Ocean leading to a series of thunderstorms and convective clouds (see below).
Are you the white cloud breaking at sea? That’s what I’m talking about!
The atmosphere over the Pacific Ocean is very unstable due to cold air moving over warm waters. This causes large changes in temperature with altitude causing convection of air, not unlike stirring oatmeal in a pan on a hot stove.
A very deep upper-level trough of low pressure is located over the northeast Pacific and temperatures (below) are much lower than normal (blue in the map below at about 5000 ft)
SeaTac only warmed to 41F today, ELEVEN degrees below normal. Many of you have seen that today there are snowflakes mixed with rain, and a large amount of snow has fallen in the mountains, where the amount of snow is increasing rapidly.
The latest forecasts show we’re in for a rough patch The first half of March was unusually cold. Consider the ingenious European Ensemble forecasting system, which combines multiple forecasts. Over the next ten days, expect much colder than normal conditions across the ENTIRE Western United States (blue and green)
The same system is forecast to bring heavy snow over the same period (10 days) from California to British Columbia.
The next 48 hours will bring plenty of snow to the coast and the Olympics—with the Olympics precisely the mountainous area needing snow (see below).
I believe there is a good chance the snowpack will be close to normal by the end of the month, but time will tell.
