The temperature inversion today over Seattle is one of the strongest I have ever seen.
As a reminder, an inversion is when temperature increases with height, in contrast to the normal decrease with height.
The conditions at SeaTac Airport this morning are shown below.
42°F at the surface and 61°F at 2100 feet.
19°F warmer. Just amazing.
To illustrate, consider the temperatures this morning near Carnation, Washington. A range from 60 to 39F over a few miles. 60 to 42°F over a short walk.
A super-inversion was also observed on the coast at Forks (see below, temperatures in °C and height in pressure, 700 hPa is about 10,000 ft)
But it failed to get the lowest temperatures correct. Current modeling systems have too much vertical mixing and thus fail to maintain the low temperatures at the bottom of inversions. We are working on this.
The record high for today at SeaTac is 64F (see below). There is a good chance we will tie or beat it.
What weather pattern is producing such an extreme inversion? As shown by the 500 hPa heights (pressure around 18,000 ft), there was a huge ridge of high pressure over the western US. Such high pressure is associated with great warmth aloft and a lack of serious clouds.
As the sun heats the surface, it causes vertical mixing, the warm air will be brought down to the surface, and daily record high temperatures for the date are quite possible.
Here are the predicted temperatures at 2 PM this afternoon. Western Washington will be torrid, especially on the slopes.. Several stations will climb into the low to mid-60s today in western Washington. Perfect for a walk, bike ride, or raking up leaves. Much cooler in eastern Washington.
I am planning on a long run this afternoon.😀
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Back in October, I made a statement that the bulk of the month would fail to hit 65 (which was correct), but we'd end up reaching that mark again in early November - albeit with wind and rain (thankfully not correct). I got my daily bike ride in before the football game, and I went from having cold hands at the start to being overdressed at the end. Today is just another beautiful (but frustrating) reminder that this kind of weather is possible this time of year.
ReplyDeleteMeasured 68° in Lake Stevens at 12:15 pm today. Felt like Summer!
ReplyDeleteWent for a row this morn at 630. 48 degrees at my house in Kingston - about 350 ft elev - and 38 degrees on Liberty Bay in Poulsbo. If I'd known it was going to be that cold, I probably would have stayed in bed.
ReplyDeleteThere was a very localized “heat burst” that affected portions of Bellingham last night. At ~7:15PM, the temperature was in the low 50s with light northerly/northwesterly wind, ~80% RH, and dew points in the upper 40s. Then, the wind began to shift to the south/southeast, becoming slightly breezy with gusts ~20MPH. The temperature proceeded to climb while the RH and dew point fell. The peak of the heat occurred ~8:30PM with temperatures peaking in the upper 60s, RH falling <45%, and dew points dropping into the low 40s.
ReplyDeleteI can only surmise that the weak frontal system which crossed the area last night was responsible for this event. Presumably, as the pressure gradient shifted due to localized low pressure along the frontal boundary, the wind shift from N/NW to S/SE resulted in an isolated area of relatively strong down-sloping from the foothills located immediately south and east of the city. Not only did the down-sloping cause warming and drying of the air but the fact that a strong temperature inversion was in place at the time meant that the source air was significantly warmer and drier than it would have been under more typical atmospheric conditions. Areas further away from the hills, including KBLI, experienced a similar event - but of lesser magnitude.
The temperature at my location rose 13 degrees in just over an hour, reaching a maximum of ~67F a few minutes before 8:30PM. This is the warmest November temperature I’ve measured since 2017.
Neat! Love mesoscale weather.
DeleteDidn't know you like to run, Cliff. I am planning a long run as soon as my toe heals. As for the temperature, it reached about 64 degrees in Bothell. It was perfect for raking leaves, and other yard work.
ReplyDeleteSunday was a pretty nice day across the South Sound and out at the coast (more so around Tacoma than Aberdeen, but still good everywhere). I was wondering why it was feeling warmer than the forecasts had been calling for, and this explains it. Thank you for breaking down the science that shapes our weather each and every day.
ReplyDeleteIf you don't mind me getting off topic for a moment, someone I know claims to have seen something on Facebook (I have not seen the exact post or comment they were referring to as I am not a Facebook user) claiming that our region will be expierencing Bomb Cyclone conditions this upcoming Thursday. Is there any truth to this? I'm not seeing any mention of Bomb Cyclone conditions in the weather.com or NWS forecasts for the day. Just typical rain, breezy wind (coastal areas only), and maybe some dry time in the afternoon. If you would be willing to address this, I would greatly appreciate it. Thank you very much!
IDC9
Thank you for addressing this in your November 12th blog.
DeleteIt's Veteran's day (Tuesday) and it WAS nice on Sunday. Got the tree lights on my outdoor tree so am ready for time to turn them on.
ReplyDeleteIt's beautiful out there now at 9:44AM and while it's not raining, I'll bring in the rest of the Christmas stuff from the shed so I can have it at hand when I begin to decorate.
Nice that I have today off work. Trying right now to figure out why I can't connect to my networked drive on my laptop, but can on the desktop and both had the SMB turned off. Something Windows I think does periodically. Also, my network settings keeps being reset to public, when it should be private.
Either way, 44F at this point and the Weather Channel says foggy, peaks of sun late and a high of 53F. It's glorious out there currently, but puffy clouds in places and blue skies otherwise.
Is there any corellation between climate change and inversions? I'm wondering if even modest increases of surface temperature can have major impacts on things like freezing level and snowfall? Any research?
ReplyDelete