Moisture associated with a system moving into northern california will remain over the area into thursday morning. temperatures will be cool enough that precipitation late tonight and early thursday morning may fall as snow or a rain-snow mix on higher hills. Showers with low snow levels will continue for the rest of thursday into friday night as an upper low remains in the area. A brief dry spell over the weekend before the next system arrives later on monday into tuesday.
Temperatures running a wide range this afternoon over w wa with mid 40s along the coast where they have caught some peeks of sunshine today. Meanwhile...under the clouds...the remainder of the cwa has temps as low as 33 in tacoma and bremerton to just shy of 40 at sea-tac and port angeles at the time of this writing. With such a wide spread of temps...should not be any surprise that precip is also running the gamut with some locations reporting light snow...some reporting light rain and some reporting a mix. For locations seeing snow or mixed precip...the expectation remains that little to no accumulation is expected and that anything that does stick will likely be more in grassy areas with no impact to roadways. Current radar trends showing a very gradual northeast/easterly movement...with much of the olympic peninsula and coastal areas out of the action. The back edge is coming up on the western shores of the sound...so it looks like the eastern half of the cwa still has some precip to deal with for the remainder of the afternoon and into tonight.
12z models remain consistent with activity becoming more scattered during the evening and overnight hours. The gradual eastward progression of the upper level low however looks to retain showers in the forecast again for thursday and into friday. Models keep the best chances for precip during the daytime...becoming scattered during the early morning and overnight hours. The complicating factor...just as it was today...will be snow levels as they oscillate from near 1000 feet during the afternoon and evening hours to 200- 400 feet during the overnight and early morning hours. Thus...this will perpetuate the threat for mixed precip or light snow over the remainder of the short term.
Temperatures will remain below normal...with highs thursday and friday generally in the lower to mid 40s. Overnight lows will remain cold as well...not making any progress out of the upper 20s to lower 30s.
As expected during the morning discussion...inherited forecast trends remain intact with some fine tuning to incorporate current conditions and most recent model solutions. smr
Good news everyone...the upper low pushes out of the area during the overnight hours friday night/saturday morning allowing for dry conditions to take root for the weekend. Models are not really all that synced up when it comes to meteorological features but the bottom line remains the same...some degree of ridging will keep w wa dry saturday and sunday...although the gfs tries to dirty up the ridge saturday afternoon and evening...although this seems a bit off. Moving into the start of next week...let us simply say that monday will live up to its usual nefarious reputation bringing a return of precip to the area. Fortunately...it does look like conditions will warm to the point that this incoming system will be mostly if not all rain. although the associated upper level trough will linger over the area tuesday...both models agree that it should exit by next wednesday.
As already alluded to...temps are expected to warm up with highs over the weekend getting awfully close to 50 in many lowland locations for the entire extended period. Overnight lows however will lag a bit...not really getting any warmer until monday night where low temps might creep into the mid 30s. smr
River flooding is not expected for the next 7 days.
Wa...none. Pz...small craft advisory until 4 am pst thursday for central u.s. waters strait of juan de fuca-east entrance u.s. Waters strait of juan de fuca.
small craft advisory until 4 am pst friday for coastal waters from cape flattery to james island 10 to 60 nm-coastal waters from james island to point grenville 10 to 60 nm- coastal waters from point grenville to cape shoalwater 10 to 60 nm.
Flow will become moderately onshore tonight as a surface trough along the coast moves into the interior. Small craft advisory strength westerly winds are likely over the outer coastal waters and in the strait. Onshore flow will continue thursday then weaken friday as a surface ridge builds over the waters. Weak offshore flow is likely to return over the weekend as ridging builds east of the cascades. Chb
Southwesterly flow aloft tonight will become more westerly thursday as an upper level low near vancouver island moves east and weakens. At the surface, light northerly winds will change to southerly and onshore tonight. Light precipitation, mostly snow but with some rain mixed in, moved north through western washington and lowered ceilings to ifr and mvfr. Ceilings are likely to remain ifr or low end mvfr all night and most of thursday.
Ksea...precipitation will probably be mixed rain and snow for the next few hours, with ifr ceilings. Then after 02z or so there will be a lull in precipitation with ceilings rebounding to low end mvfr. Snow is likely late tonight and early thursday. Accumulation less than 1 inch, and probably more on grass than pavement. Light north wind this evening will become southerly 10-15 kt tonight. Chb