January 2, 2024

Starting the Quarter With Some Rain

Last updated 5:55 PM, Tuesday, January 2nd, 2024

By Joseph Renalds

Happy Tuesday Huskies!

We hope that you had a great winter break and were able to enjoy Christmas and any other holiday festivities. The new year of 2024 started off amazingly with the Husky Sugar Bowl victory last night even despite the stressful ending. Go Huskies!

If you were not here in Seattle over the break you did not miss anything too eventful weatherwise. Unlike last year, there were no ice storms leading up to Christmas, just some typical wind and rain. In fact we actually had the warmest December on record in terms of average temperature. On December 29, many areas to the east of Seattle saw temperatures get into the low 60s as a result of downslope winds out of the Cascade mountains. The chart below shows whether a daily high temperature was above or below average in December 2023. As you can see, most days were above average.

These warmer temperatures and lack of precipitation in the later half of December has led to fairly poor snowpack in the mountains compared to what we see on average during this time of the year. However, forecasts look optimistic for additional mountain snow in January starting Friday night.

Check out this map here: Natural Resources Conservation Service

To start the first day of the quarter tomorrow, we can expect some lighter rain throughout the day. Temperatures will top out around 50 degrees while the overnight temperature will be in the low 40s. We can expect more moderate rain on Thursday and Friday before a more substantial cold front moves through on Friday night.

The next seven days will be interesting for the weather for several reasons. First, cooler temperatures over the weekend will allow snow levels to drop down to pass levels and build snowpack for ski resorts and water supply. Second, models have been trying to bring in cooler air to the region over the last few day’s runs. The general period they are hinting at is in about seven to ten days time. This means that there is plenty of time for the forecast to change. So if you see a snowflake pop up on your phone’s weather app, just know that it is by no means a confident forecast. We will have more information on this in future blogs so make sure to stay tuned.

I hope everyone has a good start to Winter Quarter. Have a great week Huskies!

Reach forecasters Joseph Renalds at theuwdawgcast@gmail, on Twitter @TheUWDawgcast, or on Instagram @uwdawgcast.