Weather ‘switch flips’ in October across Western Washington

It’s rainy, windy, and warm, but Cliff Mass says that’ll all change by the weekend as this warm weather front moves past the Puget Sound region.

Mass, an atmospheric scientist at the University of Washington, told KTTH’s Jason Rantz Show on Thursday that drier, colder weather is on its way by Friday.

“We have a really good weekend ahead,” he said, adding that this is pretty typical weather for late October when the bottom drops out.

“Septembers are very nice here in general, except this September,” Mass said. “But generally September is pretty nice. And our weather can hold out into mid-October. But then as we get into late October, that’s when the switch flips.”

Mass said the stormiest time of year across Western Washington is the third week of November, and Thanksgiving weekend is “ground zero for bad weather.”

Further out, it’s a La Nina year, so Mass said that’ll mean cooler than normal temperatures and wetter than normal conditions.

“I think it’s a slam dunk we will have more snow than normal in the mountains,” he said. “In the lowlands, it’s a little harder to predict, but the the meteorological dice are weighted to a better than typical chance of snow in the lowlands.”

As for bomb cyclones and weather whiplash in California, Mass said he worries that the media gets it wrong. Especially climate stories. He explained that what’s happening now in California is pretty typical. Some periods are dry and others are wet. There’s no weather whiplash due to global warming.

“That’s the nature of weather in California,” Mass said.

Additionally, a single storm doesn’t say anything about climate change.

Listen to the Jason Rantz Show weekday afternoons from 3 – 6 p.m. on KTTH 770 AM (or HD Radio 97.3 FM HD-Channel 3). Subscribe to the podcast here.