November Review and a Look Ahead

Two weeks ago (see blog here) the computers were indicating that cold air would slip into our area after Thanksgiving.  And for the most part that has come true.  Will it last?  You probably already know the answer if you've looked at your phone weather app.  More on this in a minute.

First, lets have a quick review of November weather.  And surprisingly, it was rather similar to October.  Here's the precipitation percent of normal for the month of November.  For the second straight month, California and Arizona precipitation was well above normal.  There were other wetter-than-normal spots in the US, including the Inland Northwest.

Zooming into the Northwest, again, it looks rather similar to October.  Eastern Washington was well above normal, especially in the Columbia Basin.  Meanwhile, western Washington was actually drier than normal once again.  Also note how dry Oregon and southern Idaho were. This precipitation pattern indicates that most of the moisture has been coming from the south.  That flow pattern eliminates the Cascade rain shadow.  It also is less favorable for western Washington rain, which prefers storms coming from the west.

Zooming in further still and looking at the total precipitation since October 1st, it's clear that the Basin has been the big winner so far this water year, with some areas between Yakima and Tri-Cities receiving nearly twice the normal amount of moisture.  Oddly enough, northeast Washington is right around average, with some spots in Stevens and Pend Oreille counties actually falling a bit below average.

For temperatures in the Northwest, November 2025 was a mild month.  The snow shovels and plows saw very little action.  But look how mild it was to our south.  Parts of southwest Wyoming were more than 10 degrees warmer than normal for the month.  Suffice to say, ski resorts in the Northwest didn't see an early start to the season.

The snow that you have on your fields right now won't last long.  After a dusting of snow on Thursday, a stronger system will push through the area on Friday.  This will bring more snow to our area, especially north of Spokane.  But it will also bring warmer and breezy weather through the weekend and all of next week.  High temperatures will consistently warm into the 40s and could warm to near 50F on Tuesday.  There will be periods of rain as well.

All this warmth, wind and rain will easily melt all of our snow, and bring back the mud.  How long will that last?  Probably all of next week.  The European model does show another pattern change around next weekend, with a high pressure ridge west of Alaska and cooler air for British Columbia and the Pacific Northwest.

The European climate model shows that this kind of pattern could continue into the holidays.  The outlook below is for the week around New Year's, which also shows high pressure out by the Aleutian Islands and cooler air in our vicinity.

At this point I'm not calling for a White Christmas (especially after the past two winters).  But the forecast pattern at this point does look favorable.