Inland Northwest Hay Weather

To say it’s been a mild winter so far would be an understatement. How mild?  Here’s the temperature departure from normal for the last 90 days.  Crazy warmth in the West. Parts of the central Rockies are more that 10 degrees above average. That’s huge. Meanwhile it’s been cold in the East.  Just for fun, here is the temperature outlook from the Climate Prediction Center issued in October for the same time period as above. They didn’t show any below normal temperatures anywhere in the lower 48 states. They said the Northeast would be warmer than usual. Not their best outlook. Let’s zoom in on the Northwest. Just about everywhere east of the Cascades has been at least 4 degrees warmer than average, with some locations more than 6 degrees warmer.  Here’s some interesting graphics. When you average all of the temperatures in each state and rank them, December 2025 was the warmest December on record (131 years of data) in several western states, including Washington and O...

We’ve been discussing in the past couple of blogs the potential for snow and cold weather this weekend. Based on the recent computer forecast models, I would say that the odds of cold and snow are looking very slim at this point . Of the over 100 computer forecasts, none of them show sub-zero temperatures this weekend, and only about 1% of them have temperatures dropping into the single digits.  The cold Canadian air is expected to stay east of the Continental Divide. We should see colder temperatures at night this weekend.  But that’s because our cloud blanket that’s keeping us mild at night should be pushed to our south by a northeast breeze on Friday.  Speaking of which, here’s what our cloud blanket looks like from space As for snow?  There’s about a 20% chance of a dusting of snow on Sunday or Monday.  We’re still looking at milder temperatures next week to finish out the month of January. This would be accompanied by a chance of rain next week.  Inter...

  Four days ago I mentioned that the computer forecasts were “hinting” at some colder weather starting around the 23rd. Four days later, they’re still hinting at it, albeit a stronger hint. But we’re starting to see some potential details.  First, the odds of colder temperatures next weekend are probably about 60% now. Not a done deal, but likely. There’s still a lot of uncertainty. Some computers give us sub-zero low temperatures while others say we won’t go below freezing. Your app is probably saying teens for a low, and that’s the best guess right now. But it could be colder. There are three sources of uncertainty: Will the cold Canadian air push in from the northeast? Will this bring us snow? Will the skies clear with calm winds after the snow stops? Canadian Air The models have been showing this potential consistently and the trend has been to push the Canadian air in here a little stronger. So for question #1 I’d answer: Yes. Snow Potential If the Canadian air comes blas...

My first winter in the Inland Northwest was 1995/96. December of that year was extremely mild, with only 0.2” of snowfall at Spokane airport. “We’re gonna pay for this” I can remember hearing. I scoffed as the first half of January brought more of the same. Then the pattern changed.  Snow started on the 19th and 10 days later we had 15” on the ground with single digit highs and -17F lows. Groundhogs Day would have a low of -24F. Quite an introduction to Inland Northwest winter. Five days of rain and temperatures near 50 melted all that snow in a hurry. This caused record flooding on the Palouse.  I’ve heard the “we’re gonna pay for this term” numerous times. My guess is that it rarely pans out like it did during the winter of 1995/96.   Could we be in for the same fate 30 years later? First let’s take a look back at last month. December 2025 was incredibly mild.  It was in the top 5 warmest Decembers at just about every observation site in Washington record. For...

Just a quick update on the weather for the next few days.  Christmas Eve  A warm front will potentially bring record warmth to parts of the region. Spokane’s warmest Christmas Eve was in 1919 with a high of 55 degrees. We probably won’t reach that, but a high around 50 is possible. Walla Walla and Pendleton  will warm into the mid 60s tomorrow.  Not very Christmas type weather.  Christmas Day Temperatures remain in the 40s with rain showers in the afternoon and evening.  Friday A windy day with afternoon showers and gusts up to 35 mph. A slight chance that the rain could change to snow on Friday evening.  Saturday and Sunday A chilly weekend with lows in the 20s and highs in the mid 30s.  So this will be the third brown Christmas in a row at Spokane. And 6 of the last 8 Christmases have been brown at Spokane.  

For most of the country, a White Christmas is either impossible or too rare to actually gets your hope up for. But in the Spokane area, the odds are more like 50-50, with even better odds north of the metro area.  But with the last two Brown Christmases, statistics were in our favor.  To add to that, the climate models were predicting that the mild temperatures would be replaced with a cooler weather pattern for the holidays. And while the weather has cooled down, it’s not exactly great snow pattern for the Inland Northwest.  Here’s the current forecast for Christmas. The central and eastern US will have a rather mild holiday, while the West Coast will be cooler.  Unfortunately for us, the majority of the weather in this pattern will be aimed at California.  Lots of rain and Sierra snow expected there. Temperature forecasts for the next week are cold enough for snow, at times. But our high temperatures will be near 40, so rain is also a possibility at those time...