If you liked wet and wild you’ll love what’s coming. Remember a couple of weeks ago I pointed out what could happen with the jet stream and post tropical depressions? Check out post tropical Songda headed right at us this weekend. WOW!
WEATHER ALERT! This is NOT a drill.
Don’t say we didn’t try to warn you. Starting tonight along the coast you can expect high winds and plenty of rain. This however is just the start of what will be a prolonged high wind and rain event lasting through Sunday. Starting on Thursday evening the South coast of Washington and the San Juan Islands can expect 30+ knots of southeasterly breeze, with Bellingham Bay, Pt Townsend, and Admiralty Inlet seeing 40+ knots.
By Friday morning this will extend to the central Sound from Tacoma to Everett seeing 25-30 knots. Remember also that this a time of unusually high tides which combined with high winds can wreak havoc in marina’s. On the coast the highs will be at noon and midnight. In Seattle on Thursday the high will be at 1537, Friday morning 0400 10’, Friday afternoon 1611 11.6’, Sat morning 0445 10.7 feet, Sat afternoon 1645 11.9’ .
Saturday morning on the coast will see the arrival of the next front, with high winds coming up again in the San Juan Islands. By midmorning the winds will be building in the central Sound, and Admiralty Inlet. Just before noon the south coast will be seeing 50+ knots of southerly , with winds over the central Sound, Admiralty Inlet and San Juan’s rising to 30+ from the south. This will continue through evening with the strongest winds, 60+ knots, being over the north coast, Westport to Neah Bay. Expect winds of 30-45 knots from Olympia to the Straits of Georgia with potentially higher winds in Admiralty Inlet and Port Townsend.
As I said, this is a prolonged high wind and rain event with the potential to knockout power, take down trees, cause lowland flooding, generally make a mess of things. If you haven’t already, it’s time to add extra mooring lines and fenders. If you’ve left your roller furling sails up, it’s time to get those down and into your sailmaker for their annual inspection and maintenance.
Be safe.
Ed. Note: I believe Bruce, and took the genny off Slipstream already. Here are the warnings from a couple of other guys who know a lot about weather in the Northwest:
Cliff Mass’s Take on the upcoming event is here.
Last Saturday’s PSSC Blast
You could see in the Friday morning surface chart that a new low was forming and in the Saturday morning chart it was going to rapidly move over the area. By Friday night the gradient was deepening way more than expected and by Saturday morning the NWS had issued small craft warnings for the Sound and Admiralty Inlet.
If you checked the gradient over the Northwest the Portland to Bellingham difference was 3.2 millibars which tells you to expect 30 knots over the central Sound. In the eastern straits, Protection Island, Dungeness Spit it was northeasterly at less than 5 knots. Ah yes, micro-weather in the Pacific Northwest.
Bruce has raced and cruised the Pacific Northwest his entire life. He earned a Bachelor’s of Science from the University of Washington in Biological Oceanography and learned meteorology “to keep from getting kicked around on the race course.” Bruce spent nearly two decades as Associate Publisher for Northwest Yachting Magazine, retiring in mid-2015, and was the chairman of the board of trustees for the Northwest Marine Trade Association in 2014. (photo of Bruce driving Playstation is a bit dated, but cool)