a weblog of whereabouts & interests, since 2010
Happy Friday the Thirteenth.
It was rainy and dark all day outside (but not quite as dark as in the forest from The Nutcracker in the picture below).
It has been foggy at night and into the early morning— and cold outside— the whole week, with a high of only 42°F (5°C) yesterday.
It is clearer outside tonight, and there will be rain tomorrow.
The rainy weather has stopped, and the forecast for the next week or so can be described as ‘morning fog, and partly sunny the rest of the day’.
The lows will be mid- to high 30s (3 °C) and the highs 46°F (8 °C) or so.
The amigos played pickleball inside at the Sandman’s Courts in Columbia City today.
There was sun outside, but the high was only 55°F (13°C).
It was a beautiful fall day here in Seattle (63° F / 17°C), with a blue sky and sun this afternoon.
Landfall was to the south of Tampa and St. Petersburg, sparing those areas a large storm surge out of Tampa Bay.
That is not to say there is not a lot of water there. Some areas around St. Petersburg received more than 16″ of rain in the last 24 hours. 😱
Tensions are running high in Florida. Emergencies have been declared, with evacuation orders, in dozens of Florida counties.
There are reports of clogged highways and interstates, and many gas stations running out of gas, as drivers make their way out of the storm’s path.
Jason Samenow of the Washington Post explains below why it matters exactly where near Tampa, the hurricane makes landfall (projected to be very late on Wednesday night, or early Thursday morning).
Milton was a Category 5 hurricane in the Gulf of Mexico late Monday Eastern time.
Right now the models predict that it will make landfall near Saint Petersburg and Tampa, Florida, on Wednesday night.
Hurricane Helene is one of the biggest storms on record to strike the Gulf Coast. A few hours before making landfall, Helene had winds of at least tropical storm force, a sustained 39 mph or greater, across some 420 miles.
According to an analysis by Colorado State University hurricane scientist Phil Klotzbach, Helene is larger than all but two gulf storms since 1988: Opal, a Category 3 storm that made landfall on the Florida Panhandle in October 1995, and Irma, a Category 4 storm that struck South Florida in September 2017.
When a storm is so large, it means more people are exposed to its hazards, which extend hundreds of miles away from the point of landfall.
– From reporting by Scott Dance, Simon Ducroquet and John Muyskens in The Washington Post
The black-eyed Susans, the pretty asters (picture below), and some sunflowers here in my neighborhood are the last of this summer’s flowers.
It was a very pleasant 70°F (21 °C) today, with a blue sky and sun this afternoon.
We’re going to warm up to 88°F (31°C) tomorrow here in Seattle: warm for late summer.
Our summer temperatures are nothing compared to a place such as Phoenix, Arizona, of course.
At 11 a.m. local time this morning, temperatures in Phoenix hit 100° F (38°C) for the 100th day in a row. The longest previous 100-degree streak was 76 days in 1993.
WHIDBEY ISLAND STATION, Wash. — Residents of and near Whidbey Island witnessed a weather phenomenon on Tuesday as “wave clouds” lined the horizon.
Kelvin-Helmholtz clouds or fluctus clouds, as the formations are named, are very rare over Washington, according to KING 5 Chief Meteorologist Mike Everett.
The clouds look like literal waves in the sky, a series of rounded crests that are worthy of a double-take.
Often referred to as “wave clouds,” the clouds signal a difference in wind speed and density between two layers.
– Reported by Olivia Sullivan for king5.com
Happy Friday.
There was steady rain here in the city today (about 0.5″), and there will be more this weekend.
It was all of 58°F (14°C) as I headed out for a quick walk after dinner.
A little bit of rain, a little sun, clouds— that seems to be the weather pattern for the week. A high of 71 °F (22 °C) today.
It’s the last hurrah for my deck furniture before I put it away in the garage and the basement.
A large thunderstorm with rain and lightning is passing over the Seattle metro area tonight.
Here is tonight’s sunset, seen from Capitol Hill’s 14th Avenue at Thomas Street.
That’s a layer of smoke out there, from the wildfires east of the Cascades, and also from those burning in Oregon and California.
Happy Friday.
The Blue Angels are in town for Seafair, and the warm weather is back for the next several days.
It was 88°F (31°C) today.
This is the driest day on the calendar for our region*— but there was a little bit of steady rain around the city this morning.
*When looking at daily averages for 79 years of records at the Seattle-Tacoma airport weather station.
We had 18 consecutive days above 80°F (26°C) in the city by Sunday— a record number of consecutive days.
The run ended on Monday, which brought a high of only 68°F (20°C).
It was another beautiful blue sky day here in the city— 85°F (29 °C).
