Unusual April weather pattern responsible for unusual snowstorm
Blossoms are covered with snow on a tree in McCosh Park in Moses Lake during Thursday’s snowstorm. The unexpected cold weather of the last few weeks are well outside of the norm for the Columbia Basin as a whole.
Cheryl Schweizer/Columbia Basin Herald
Snow piles up on the blossoms on a flowering tree in McCosh Park in Moses Lake Thursday morning.
Snow covers blossoms on a flowering tree in Moses Lake’s McCosh Park Thursday morning.
MOSES LAKE — What the - ? Was that - was that a snowstorm in the Columbia Basin Thursday morning?
Why yes, yes it was. Now, the snow was melting by midafternoon, but it really did snow all morning.
Historical records from the National Weather Service date back further for Ephrata than Moses Lake, and Steven Van Horn, meteorologist with the NWS Spokane office, said there were two days in history when it snowed more than one inch in Ephrata in April. They were April 6, 1980 and April 12, 1955.
“Quite unusual,” Van Horn said of measurable snow on April 14.
The culprit was cold air sneaking down from Canada.
“In a broad sense, we’re in a cold and unstable low pressure area,” Van Horn said.
The cold air has been around for about a week, and it mixed with moisture coming through to produce a January-like day on April 14.
“The places that are seeing these little disturbances come through are seeing bursts of heavier snow,” he said.
It’s unusual to have this kind of cold air in the Columbia Basin in April, Van Horn said, and it mixed with an unusual pattern of precipitation.
It was snowing in Quincy and Othello on Thursday morning, according to employees of both cities.
It was cold in Ephrata, and it’s supposed to be pretty cold on Friday, the night of the city’s annual Flashlight Easter Egg Hunt. So Ephrata Parks and Recreation officials are taking that into account.
“It’s going to be a super-quick thing,” said Josh Johnson of the Ephrata Parks and Rec Department.
The cold air has been breaking records in its own way - high temperatures have been the lowest recorded for this period in April, Van Horn said. Those daily high temps have been about 10 degrees below average for the area.
But temperatures are supposed to start warming up, at least a little. High temperatures are forecast for the mid-50s by Sunday, and the mid-60s by Wednesday.
“That’s still below normal, but at least it’s getting closer to normal,” he said.
