A good Wednesday to you! Its felt a little more like winter today, with light showers and mist for much of the day. A cold front moved through last night, and has brought cooler air to the state. The big storms from last night are long gone, with severe weather over parts of Florida. As [...]
: skip to main skip to sidebar Cliff Mass Weather Blog This blog provides my latest forecast or comments on current weather or other topics Tuesday , March 29, 2011 Atmospheric River and Rainshadows In past blogs I have talked about atmospheric rivers---plumes of moisture approaching our region that generally start in the tropic and subtropics . These moisture rivers are generally associated with warm air since warm air can contain more water vapor than cold air and they can dump huge amounts of precipitation when they interact with the substantial terrain of our . region You know the most famous of these atmospheric rivers well . the Pineapple Express , which begins somewhere near . Hawaii Not all atmospheric rivers approach us from the southwest , and our region is about to be influenced
Back when we were in the thralls of a riveting snow event in late February, We trotted out these maps from the University of Washington forecast models that showed predicted snow totals for the lowlands. Sure, they didn't bat 1.000 but overall, these maps do OK.
With lowland snow but a distant memory and heavy rains now in the forecast, you might be interested to know the UW model also puts out similar charts for anticipated 24 hour rainfall.
And for this event, the models do a great job of highlighting an expected rain shadow that could form over the greater Seattle area.
This particular map shows expected 24 hour rain accumulation from 5 a.m. Wednesday through 5 a.m. Thursday.
A good Tuesday to you! Our forecast will include a good bet for rain and storms late this evening and tonight. Showers and storms will gradually increase as a surface and upper level impulse spins up to our west. Rain will become heavy at times tonight and early on Wednesday. Some storms could grow strong [...]
. , , , Advanced Search News Video Weather Traffic Sports Entertainment Living Communities KOMO 4 TV KOMO Newsradio Local Deals Blogs Radar Satellite School Delays Forecast Maps FAQ Cameras Quakes Links Ski Report Stay Connected : Watch live : KOMO 4 TV What's on : nbsp Listen : KOMO Newsradio Police Scanner YouNews Promotions Advanced Search Problem Solvers Disaster Relief : Japan How much rain in Port Orchard A half gallon and counting . Tools 0 Comments Email this article Facebook Tweet Digg Print this article By Scott Sistek Story Created : Mar 28, 2011 at 3:34 PM PDT Story Updated : Mar 28, 2011 at 3:43 PM PDT The town of Forks always brags that with their 120 of rain a year , they measure it in . feet Judy Harder of Port Orchard took a different tack she accidentally left her
A good Monday to you! Many of us woke up to lightning and small hail last night, as storms rolled across our area. A severe storm moved right over Tuscaloosa at about 1am, which brought large hail to parts of the area. I had nickel sized hail at my house on the east side of [...]: , , skip to main skip to sidebar Cliff Mass Weather Blog This blog provides my latest forecast or comments on current weather or other topics Sunday , March 27, 2011 Visit to China , the Great Firewall , and An Amazing Jet You might have noticed my blog decreased in frequency a bit during the past week and there were some issues with the . graphics The reason I have been in Beijing the last ten days giving a short-course on weather systems and forecasting technology to forecasters from throughout China . My colleague in this adventure was Brad Colman , head of the Seattle Office of the National Weather Service . I was really impressed with my Chinese colleagues--they want to build a first-class weather infrastructure in their country and seem to have access to the resources to do so .
Isolated strong to severe storms are possible overnight across all of West Alabama. The threats will include pea to quarter size hail, gusty winds, and brief heavy downpours. Another storm system is expected to impact the area Tuesday night and may impact the area through Thursday. There are still some timing and strength questions to [...]
Water vapor imagery showed a progressive shortwave trough moving eastward from Kansas/Oklahoma this evening. With this feature expected to reach the Tennessee Valley tonight a strong mid-level jetstream accompanying the feature will support an increase in shear. Shear and moderate instability suggest a threat for severe hail as additional storms develop overnight through Mississippi [...]
HIghlights
- Continued Cool Temperatures
- Rain Chances Tues into Wed
- Warm up expected next weekend
Forecast Discussion
Currently the upper level impusle that affected our weather last night is moving out of our area. Sky’s should begin clearing today as this impusle quickly moves east. Today looks drier, however still cool, with highs near the 50 degree mark. [...]
SEVERE THUNDERSTORM WARNING NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE BIRMINGHAM AL 1128 PM CDT SAT MAR 26 2011 THE NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE IN BIRMINGHAM HAS ISSUED A * SEVERE THUNDERSTORM WARNING FOR… SOUTHWESTERN JEFFERSON COUNTY IN CENTRAL ALABAMA… NORTHERN TUSCALOOSA COUNTY IN WEST CENTRAL ALABAMA… SOUTH CENTRAL WALKER COUNTY IN CENTRAL ALABAMA… * UNTIL 1215 [...]
There’s a boundary moving south through our area. North of the boundary is cooler/more stable air. This boundary is out-running the storms, which is reducing the tornado threat. The storms you see over Lamar and Fayette Counties are severe, but they are elevated and producing large hail. These storms to the are not rooted at [...]: skip to main skip to sidebar Cliff Mass Weather Blog This blog provides my latest forecast or comments on current weather or other topics Friday , March 25, 2011 Amazing Sierra Snows Although the Cascade snowpack is roughly normal this year which is low for a La Nina year in which we expect it to be above normal the central Sierra Mountains of central CA have been hit very , very . hard The Alpine Meadows ski resort near Lake Taho is closed today due to unprecedented snowfall , high high winds and avalanche . hazards The nearby Squaw Valley has had the greatest seasonal snowfall on record , with 45 inches overnight at 8200 . ft Snow has even hit lower elevations in northern CA , with highway 101 closed between San Francisco and . Eureka The good news for California is once they get: , skip to main skip to sidebar Cliff Mass Weather Blog This blog provides my latest forecast or comments on current weather or other topics Wednesday , March 23, 2011 Finally , A Warm Day Today several locations in western Washington reached in the low 60s . in fact some surged into the mid-60s . Offshore flow helped . as air descended down the western slopes of the Cascades it it is compressed and warmed . Here is the profiler data for today from Seattle and you can see the strong SE flow off the . Cascades And here is the model surface winds , pressure , and lower atmosphere temperatures at 2 PM . You can see the offshore flow there as . well Here are the temperatures of the past 4 weeks . today really stands out as the first to really get above normal . In fact , this year is
As most know by now, I do a lot of volunteer work in the ocean activism community when I'm not storm chasing in Tornado Alley. I was in Otsuchi Japan (Iwate Prefecture) on March 11th, 2011 monitoring the slaughter of Dall's porpoises for Ric O'Barry's Save Japan Dolphins and standing just a few feet from the water on a man made pier in the middle of Otsuchi harbor when the M9.0 earthquake hit.: skip to main skip to sidebar Cliff Mass Weather Blog This blog provides my latest forecast or comments on current weather or other topics Tuesday , March 22, 2011 California Gets Hits You want intense weather Then head down to California With a high amplitude trough over the eastern Pacific , one system after another is heading to California . Here are some amazing statistics noted by my colleague Mark : Albright Point Reyes north of San Francisco reached 79 . mph At Burns Canyon 20 miles N of Palm Springs at 6300 ft , there was a wind gust of 96 knots 110 mph at noon Sunday 20 March 2011. In contrast , at 11 AM the wind was nearly calm at Palm . Springs The 27-hr total ending last night at 10 PM 20 March 2011 was 6.06 inches in Santa Barbara of which 4.13 inches fell in just 12 hours .
We received several request for this print to be made into a poster - so here it is. No text - just a large 20 x 30 in print of this incredible tornado event!
Brand new item in our StormChase.com Zazzle store - Campo Tornado and double rainbow on a mousepad. It looks great on your desk! They're great for starting conversations as well.
I've decided to add a few new photos to the image gallery. Just as a shameless plug - I do sell the photos with a variety of frames and printing options, if you see something you'd like to hang on you wall - contact me!
Long track tornadoes, large hail and high winds are expected today across portions of the deep south. This may be one of those events that catches many people off guard - those are the types of events that end up with a death toll. 
After all, they did leak the iPhone4 months before it was officially announced by Steve Jobs. Maybe they know something about this storm meteorologists dont know. Today they are talking about the big weather event that is affecting much of the central US today and will affect the northeast US tomorrow. As of this morning [...]
Hey Everyone! Just a quick update. Things are well down in Asheville North Carolina! But we can’t wait to return to New England for the holiday season! I just wanted to point out the obvious… Technology is awesome! How awesome? This entire post was made on my iPod touch! While this concept is years old, [...]
Tropical Storm Igor has formed in the Eastern Atlantic. It is forecasted to become a category 2 hurricane by early next week, but it expects to curve northward well before it reaches the mainland of the United States: And whenever I hear Igor, I think of this:: , skip to main skip to sidebar Cliff Mass Weather Blog This blog provides my latest forecast or comments on current weather or other topics Sunday , March 20, 2011 Changing Weather Pattern Reduces Radiation Risk , Brings Improved Weather The large-scale weather pattern has shifted in a way that is going to give Seattle far better weather than southern California and protect us from any Japanese radiation for a while . What configuration can provide such a boon Large-scale troughing on the West Coast that is going to send weather disturbances to our . south Here are two upper-level weather maps for the 500 mb level roughly 18,000 ft The airflow parallels the lines and the closer they are together the stronger the winds . A strong trough will be resident along the coast and the current of: skip to main skip to sidebar Cliff Mass Weather Blog This blog provides my latest forecast or comments on current weather or other topics Friday , March 18, 2011 Latest On Japanese Radiation There is still a huge amount of interest and publicity over the radiation emitted by the damaged Japanese reactors in Sendai and the potential for radiation spread to the . U.S As before , there is little if any risk of significant landfall of radioactive materials on the West Coast due to the mixing , settling , decay , and rainout of radioactive materials . even if the trajectories were straight into . us Consider the issues . First , you need a large source injected into the atmosphere . THIS HAS NOT HAPPENED YET Measurement by the U.S . assets during the past day have shown that significant: . skip to main skip to sidebar Cliff Mass Weather Blog This blog provides my latest forecast or comments on current weather or other topics Monday , March 14, 2011 The U.S . West Coast is NOT at Risk from Radiation Today I got calls and emails from all sorts of folks , worrying about the Japanese radiation reaching the Northwest in dangerous quantities . Potassium iodide pills , used for thyroid protection from radioactive iodine have been stripped from the shelves in . Seattle I think the reality is clear . there is no serious radiation threat to us here in the . Northwest First , I should note that the weather pattern is shifting and the latest trajectories show that the low-level trajectories don't reach us . see below The low-level trajectories circle around in the Pacific and the: skip to main skip to sidebar Cliff Mass Weather Blog This blog provides my latest forecast or comments on current weather or other topics Sunday , March 13, 2011 Latest Pacific Trajectories From the Japanese Reactor and Amazing Rainshadow A few people emailed me asking for update trajectories from the vicinity of the Japanese reactors . These trajectories use the NOAA Hysplit model , driven by output from the U.S . GFS global forecasting model . I have launched trajectories from 50, 4500 and 9000 meters above the surface . Keep in mind that there are considerable uncertainties in such trajectories . So here they : are Strangely , the trajectory starting at 50 meters ends right over Seattle . after nine days Even if this was true and the initial concentrations were large , trubulent and: skip to main skip to sidebar Cliff Mass Weather Blog This blog provides my latest forecast or comments on current weather or other topics Saturday , March 12, 2011 Where would the radioactivity go Although any injections of radioactivity for the damaged Japanese reactors would be highly diffused , with very low concentrations , by the time it got to us , I did a trajectory analysis using the NOAA Hysplit Model . I first released the trajectories in the general region of damaged region at 10, 1000, and 5000 meters . Here is what I : got And there I tried some higher levels : here are trajectories released more at jet stream level 7000 and 9000 meters I tried several levels because it is uncertain to what level the radioactive materials will rise . It would injected by an explosion ,: skip to main skip to sidebar Cliff Mass Weather Blog This blog provides my latest forecast or comments on current weather or other topics Friday , March 11, 2011 Tsunami A number of people emailed today about the tsunami , including their concerns about radioactivity from Japan reaching the . Northwest It turns out that the leading national research center for tsunamis is here in Seattle National Center for Tsunami Research At the Center they have developed numerical simulation models for tsunami . events Here is a simulation of the unfolding of this event click on it to enlarge You see how complicated the structure is Multiple waves , reverberating off obstacles in the basin and refracting around . islands Here is the maximum tsunami amplitude map there : produced The largest amplitudes: skip to main skip to sidebar Cliff Mass Weather Blog This blog provides my latest forecast or comments on current weather or other topics Wednesday , March 9, 2011 Heavy Rain Some amazing rain today . here is the radar image at 9:56 PM tonight . wow . lots of yellows--that is all heavy rain . It is pounding on my roof right . now And today with the front there was a very intense rainfall band crossing the Sound around noon . here is the radar image . If you look closely , there were some reds in there . a downpour , probably with some small hail mixed . in You might be interested in the quantity you are looking at in these images . they are reflectivity--a measure of the scattering of the microwave radiation emitted from the radar . The units are dbZ . You know about dbs on your sound: skip to main skip to sidebar Cliff Mass Weather Blog This blog provides my latest forecast or comments on current weather or other topics Tuesday , March 8, 2011 Cold and Wind Look at the temperatures over the past four : weeks Today , was the first day since mid-February that we reached the normal high . three weeks February was the seventh coldest at Sea-Tac since 1948. I suspect that if we looked at the period from Feb 15 though March 7th , it would be in the top three cold years at this . location A series of storms is now on tap and the first one is off our coast . Here is nice infrared satellite image this evening . Infrared IR in the business pictures tell us how much infrared radiation the earth and clouds are radiating in a certain wavelength range in which the atmosphere is: skip to main skip to sidebar Cliff Mass Weather Blog This blog provides my latest forecast or comments on current weather or other topics Sunday , March 6, 2011 Good News and Bad News The good news for some is that there is little chance of lowland snow for the next week , which probably means we are out of the woods on that . Lowland DOTs can relax . The bad news for some . the faucet is about to be turned . on Interestingly , although the last month has been substantially cooler than normal consistent with La Nina we have in fact been drier than normal . see graph for Seattle . blue is normal That is going to . end Now tomorrow will be pretty much dry , but then we will experience a series of storms . and I mean a lot of them during the next week . The flow pattern will be generally: skip to main skip to sidebar Cliff Mass Weather Blog This blog provides my latest forecast or comments on current weather or other topics Saturday , March 5, 2011 Endless Spring The weather will be quite benign the next few days . downright boring after all the action of the past month . I don't want to jinx anything , but we are now entering northwest . spring In the eastern part of the U.S . there are frequently big storms in March---remember the old saw of March coming in like a lion and going out like a lamb For us , March should be replaced by . February In our area , major storms in March---big floods , big windstorms , major lowland snowstorms-- are very , very rare . For all intents and purposes we should be done with winter . Jim Forman will be able to send out his yellow jacket: skip to main skip to sidebar Cliff Mass Weather Blog This blog provides my latest forecast or comments on current weather or other topics Thursday , March 3, 2011 Moving Rainbow Here is a really interesting video of yesterday's convection at Dale Ireland's location in Silverdale Washington . Beyond the showers and sunbreaks there are many shots of rainbows . Note how the rainbows shift to the right during the day . The reason why The sun is shifting direction and the center of the rainbow is always on the opposite side of the sky from the . sun Next blog I will tell you where you can find the pot of gold at the end of a . rainbow A reminder--I will be talking at Ivar's next week Wednesday , March 9 at 7 PM to talk about the great storm that destroyed the restaurant in 2003 see sidebar