WeatherWatcher: Wind advisory, forecast, last week's data

The National Weather Service in Seattle has issued a Wind Advisory for the greater Seattle area including the cities of Shoreline and Lake Forest Park. A wind advisory means that winds of 35mph are expected. Winds this strong can make driving difficult and cause scattered power outages and minor tree damage.

The high wind advisory is in effect from 4am Tuesday morning until 6pm Tuesday night. Strongest winds are expected Tuesday mid-morning into early afternoon. Winds will be either out of the west or southwest between 20-35mph with some gusts possible up to 40-50mph. The west coast neighborhoods such as Richmond Beach, Innis Arden, and western exposed areas of The Highlands will probably have the strongest winds.

Forecast: Tuesday is expected to be windy with about a 40% chance of showers. Wednesday will clear up a little bit for a mostly sunny day before our next storm moves in Wednesday night for another round of rain Thursday. Thursday night through Friday afternoon more rain showers are expected.

Tuesday - Friday expect to see temperatures peaking in the mid-40's and lows right around either side of the 40°F mark. Temperatures take another turn to cold starting Friday night.

Long range is showing a renewed arctic air threat moving into the region Friday night, with moisture still moving in. This new cold shot at this time looks like it might be another lasting one bringing us possible snow/rain or snow showers through Christmas Day and into next week. This one isn't appearing to be as cold as last week. We are looking at more of a marginal snow and rain mixed situation right now, but as we get closer forecasts are likely to change.

Longer range models are not showing an end to this type of freeze and thaw pattern we've been experiencing this month. This leaves plenty of opportunity for future snow events depending on timing of Pacific storms meeting these renewed arctic blasts.

Bottom line: Keep in mind there is a lot of uncertanty in longer range or even to this weekend right now, but plan ahead. It is appearing to be more possible than most years to have white Christmas this year, which would be a first since December 2008, second since December 1990. A white Christmas is defined has having at least 1 inch of accumulated snow on the ground.

Last week's data:

High temperature: 41.2°F (Saturday the 10th)

Low temperature: 23.2°F (Friday the 16th)

Rainiest day: 0.41 inches (Saturday the 10th)

Total rainfall: 0.47 inches

Warmest day: 40.2°F (Sunday the 11th)

Coldest day: 27.7°F (Friday the 16th)

Average temperature: 34.4°F (Normal average for this week is 37.6°F)

Below is a graph of our daily high and low temperatures for December. We've only been near normal for about 6 days so far this month, all other days have been below normal with some high temps not even reaching our low temperature normal.

Daily High and Low temperatures compared to station average.

Here's the monthly precipitation so far for December, running below average, but this is typical during long freezes. I've included total snow accumulation for Shoreline as well in this graph.

Precipitation for December 2016.
Average rainfall based on station average in Shoreline.

For current weather conditions visit shorelineweather.com