Time Out!

We interupt the bike interuption to bring some very important information about:

SNOW!

That's right, one day it was summer, and the next it was fall, and week later it's winter! Pretty fast changes this year. So fast that I have been caught off guard and haven't had a chance to get my winter forecast up.

Well wait no more Snow Curmudgeon fans, it is time for the Winter Outlook.

After painstakenly looking at all the data, historical trends and mostly just reading a few other forcasts and plagarizing, I have a good grasp of the winter forcast.

Some background:
Pac NW winters can often follow the trend of the Atlantic Hurricane Season. Two year's ago we had a record winter, that was following the busy Hurricane season that included Katrina. Last year we had a close to normal winter that peetered out early, and a correspondingly unremarkable Hurrucane season. This year we have had a somewhat average to quiet Hurricane season. There were a few early, and they were big-uns too. So maybe we can expect some early winter activity, then leveling off?

There is also some correlation to years when we have a wet spring we have a dry fall and vice versa. We certainly had a dry spring this year, and so far a wet fall.

We also tend to have active Winters in La Nina years, and miserable (dry and sunny) winters in El Nino years (see 04/05 the year without a winter). Right now we are boardering on a La Nina year, some forecasts call for it to weaken as the winter goes on other call for it to remain.

I think you have figured out where I am heading with this one. Expect this year's winter to come in roaring and then temper somewhat. But I am going to keep uncharacteristically optomistic and call late winter as average. I envision an early build to the snow pack with above average snow and below avergage temps through early January, with close to average temps and precip mid-January through may. That second half is hard to predict, but it looks pretty good for the first half right now.

I am not saying we will be skiing by Halloween. These early snows are exciting, but there will still be soem dry periods and warm fronts to keep the pack from building too much. But I think we can expect soem wild weather none the less.

For more enlightened forcasts check here:
http://www.ocs.oregonstate.edu/index.html

I now you return you to your previously unscheduled interuptions, I gotta go tune the skis and sno seal the leather boots!