Storm strikes Western Washington, thousands already without power

It didn’t take long for Western Washington’s next storm to start causing trouble.

Puget Sound Energy is reporting 5,271 customers without power.

Current conditions for Western Washington

By 7 a.m. about 480 customers in Sammamish were reporting outages; 398 in Renton didn’t have power. Down in Olympia, more than 1,200 customers were reporting power outages.

Over in Kitsap County, nearly 3,000 were without power around Seabeck.

More than 1,000 didn’t have power on Whidbey Island.

The strong winds have forced the closure of several schools. Redmond High and East Lake schools are closed, as well as Mack Elementary, Mack PreSchool and Faith Lutheran. Redmond Middle School, Inglewood Middle School, Kirkland Middle School and Mann Elementary are delayed two hours.

The National Weather Service issued a High Wind Warning for several areas early Thursday morning, including Bellevue, Bellingham, Everett, Olympia, Seattle, and Tacoma. Western Washington residents can expect winds of up to 40 MPH Thursday evening. Gusts of up to 60 MPH are possible.

“NW Washington will get hammed by strong southeasterly winds … for many hours,” University of Washington Climatologist Cliff Mass wrote Wednesday.

In addition to the wind, models from the National Weather Service show the West Coast could get 10 to 15 inches of rain over the next 10 days.

And of course rain and stormy weather in the lowlands means potential snow in the mountains. Mass predicts “massive amounts” of snow over British Columbia and the north Cascades. There will be less snow accumulation in the southern Cascades because of relatively warm air.

But it’s good news for skiers and snowboarders. There could be a considerable amount added to the snowpack. That will help “guarantee” skiing this holiday season, according to Mass.

Washington has hardly had much time to recover since the last storm that knocked out power to more than 300,000 and killed two people.