Oregon, Pacific Northwest Winter Predictions from One Forecaster
Published 10/020/2013
(Portland, Oregon) – If one forecaster is correct, Oregon and Washington will be in for a fairly average winter but with some serious mood swings here and there.
Steve Pierce, president of the Oregon Chapter of the American Meteorological Society (AMS) is among those starting to put forth their winter weather outlooks, and he believes it's likely the Pacific Northwest is headed for a winter of average temperatures, rainfall and snow. It doesn't appear to lean towards a La Nina or El Nino situation, and that tends to produce average winters but some occasional drastic weather events.
Pierce pointed to September and October's rather remarkable switching of places as one example, with last month being quite wet and this month extraordinarily dry. Pierce released his predictions in his blog, Steve Pierce’s Winter Weather Outlook 2013/14.
“The absence of either El Nino or La Nina increases the chances for record setting short duration weather events such as what we saw in September with record setting rainfalls,” Pierce writes. “However, when averaged out across the entire winter (Nov-Mar) this winter will be about average in the categories of temperature, precipitation and snowfall. It is interesting to note that people tend to remember the singular extreme events more so than the overall winter average.”
According to Pierce's charts and numbers, there's an increased probability of a significant snow or cold spell event, and the likelihood of one major wind storm is larger as well.
In recent decades, Pierce said the trend has been for Portland and the area to go without a snowstorm for a few years and then suddenly get a sizable one.
There is also an increased chance for one month to be wetter and warmer than usual, and another winter month to be cooler and drier. This could mean some flooding, he added.
Pierce's predictions also included an average snowfall for mountain resorts, but he also said there are some wild cards out there that could change the general trends. He also noted many other meteorologists are coming out with forecast outlooks that seem to be varying greatly from each other.
See general Oregon weather here. See Oregon coast weather here. See Pierce's full blog at Steve Pierce’s Winter Weather Outlook 2013/14.
|
