This week’s weather a stark contrast to 10 years ago
Dec 5, 2017, 10:50 AM | Updated: 1:17 pm
Interstate 5 near Chehalis was unrecognizable by Dec. 3, 2007, after a coastal storm that took Washington residents by surprise caused widespread flooding.
The storm that formed Nov. 29, 2007, lasted for several days. Then-Governor Christine Gregoire declared a state of emergency.
More than 11 inches of rain fell in some areas, the Daily Astorian reports.
I-5 was flooded at Centralia and Chehalis as Washington residents dealt with flooding on their properties and businesses.
Several people were killed and at least $1 billion in damages was done.
“I can’t imagine it’s something short of billions based on what I saw,” Gregoire told The Seattle Times.
It wasn’t until Dec. 5, 2007, that the water on I-5 began receding. The Washington State Department of Transportation reopened one lane of I-5 to commercial trucks on Dec. 6.
TVW published an anniversary video of the flooding. Watch it here.
Now compare that to our current dry spell.
According to the National Weather Service, the Puget Sound area is on track to have one of the driest starts to December in recent history. The last time Seattle had at least seven days in a row with no measurable precipitation in the month of December was 2013 (Dec. 3-11). The last time Seattle had 10 days without measurable precipitation was in 1999, according to the National Weather Service. We had a 14-day streak with no measurable precipitation in 1985.
We’ve had several days without rain and that trend is expected to continue, with forecasts calling for little to no precipitation in the Puget Sound region until at least Monday.
Let’s just hope we don’t get lost in all this fog.
