Cold weather headed Grant County's direction
MOSES LAKE — It’s that time of year. The gray clouds that hang around every winter are going away, the days are getting a little longer, spring has to be close, right?
Wrong.
It might rain on Saturday and Sunday, it might snow. But “mainly it’s going to get really, really cold,” said Matt Fugazzi, meteorologist with the National Weather Service in Spokane.
Saturday might be rainy but it should be pretty warm for mid-February, with a forecast high of 55 degrees. But that’s not going to last – Sunday’s forecast high is 39 degrees. And it just goes downhill from there – 32 degrees for Monday’s forecast high, and 15 degrees Monday night. Tuesday night’s low is forecast for 18 degrees.
If that seems a little cold for this late in the winter – well, it is a little cold for this late in the winter. It is unusual, although not unique, to have what Fugazzi called an “arctic outbreak.”
That said, “it is February. It is still winter,” Fugazzi said.
There’s a 50 percent chance of snow or rain, or snow and rain, Saturday. There’s a slightly bigger chance for snow Sunday, at 60 percent. Whatever snow falls it won’t be much, Fugazzi said; he estimated a maximum of about 1 inch.
The forecast calls for windy conditions Saturday, with wind gusts up to 35 miles per hour, and “blustery” weather Sunday. Some forecasts are including freezing rain for Monday, but Fugazzi said freezing rain is unlikely. “It’s just going to be very dry, very cold.”
The winter of 2017-18 has been remarkably non-wintry in central Washington, a little freezing rain and a notable lack of snow. Fugazzi said that was the result of high-altitude air currents and high-altitude pressure ridges.
The high pressure ridges pushed the normal flow of storms to the north, and then down over the eastern half of the U.S. The East Coast was “in the icebox” for weeks, while the West Coast had relatively good weather, at least for winter. Now the ridge is moving on, and the waves are bringing precipitation and cold weather.
While it’s still winter, it’s getting closer to spring, and weather patterns change as the air warms up and air masses move around. “Just the normal give and take, the interplay between the polar air mass and the warmer air masses,” Fugazzi said. “Things get very active when two air masses battle it out together.”
Cheryl Schweizer can be reached via email at education@columbiabasinherald.com.
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