The Great American Weather Tragedy: Excellent Forecasts But Poor Societal Response

 It has happened again and again.

Greatly improved weather forecasting technology provides a stunningly accurate forecast of a severe or impactful weather event.

But even with excellent warnings,  dozens to thousands of people lose their lives, and billions of dollars in losses occur.  

Deaths and losses that could have been prevented had there been an effective societal response.  

You know these events well, such as:

The 2025 Los Angeles wildfire event associated with strong Santa Ana winds:  31 people died, with an estimated 150 billion in damage.

Hurricane Katina in 2005, which hit New Orleans, killing nearly 2000 people and resulting in 160 billion dollars of damage.

The 2023 Lahaina fire, produced by well-forecast strong downslope winds descending the West Maui mountains, killed 100 people and destroyed the scenic town of Lahaina (roughly 30 billion dollars in damage)

Lahaina, Hawaii

Hurricane Maria (2017) killed over 3000 people and resulted in tens of billions of dollars of damage.

I could list another dozen events like these, with over 10,000 Americans losing their lives and over ONE TRILLION dollars in loss.

Each of these events was nearly perfectly predicted by modern weather prediction models.  

Most of the lives lost and damage could have been avoided with effective societal planning and responses.

A critical story that the American media has never covered.

This blog will review some of these events and explain what could have been done better.   I just submitted a paper on this topic, so this is something I have deeply researched and thought about.

Let me go into a few of the events in more detail.

2005 Hurricane Katrina

Hurricane Karina struck the U.S. Gulf Coast on August 29, 2005, producing extensive flooding of New Orleans due to levee failures.  This storm resulted in 1833 deaths, the displacement of millions of people, and approximately $161 billion in damage, making it the costliest hurricane in U.S. history.  

Both the National Hurricane Center (NHC) and local NWS offices produced accurate and timely forecasts for Katrina.  The forecast track 72 h before landfall was close to the observed, with accurate predictions of storm intensity and location during the final 48 h.  Several post-storm service assessments found significant deficiencies in pre-storm preparation and post-storm response.  For example, local officials delayed ordering a mandatory evacuation in New Orleans until 19 hours before landfall, leading to hundreds of unnecessary deaths. The response from FEMA and other Federal agencies was delayed and inadequate, with communications failures hindering effective action to save lives and property.  Finally, the levee infrastructure protecting New Orleans was not designed for the passage of a strong hurricane, with improvements delayed by legal actions from environmental organizations.

2017 Hurricane Maria

Hurricane Maria reached Puerto Rico on September 20, 2017, as a Category 4-5 hurricane, resulting in nearly 3000 deaths and over $90 billion in economic losses.  The infrastructure of the island was devastated, with prolonged power, communications, and water outages as well as major damage to buildings, roads, and bridges.  The track forecast was highly accurate, indicating a major hurricane passing over the island 3-4 days in advance.  48 h before landfall, the storm was predicted to make landfall as a Category 5 hurricane.

Puerto Rico after Maria

The extreme death toll in Puerto Rico was associated with poorly maintained power, cellular, and water infrastructure that collapsed during the storm.  Lack of planning and crisis management led to an inadequate response, made worse by a massive communication system failure.  Many of the deaths occurred in the elderly who were unable to access critical medical care.

2025 Los Angeles Wildfire

On January 7-9, 2025, a strong Santa Ana event, accompanied by intense downslope winds, resulted in several major wildfires around the Los Angeles Basin, resulting in over $150 billion in economic loss and 30 deaths.  The predictability of the wind event was high, with accurate predictions within three days of the start of the strong, dry winds. The day before the fires (January 6), the Los Angeles NWS office released an apocalyptic message predicting extreme risk from the strong winds as well as an Extreme Fire warning for the Los Angeles area.   I even blogged about it the day before!

Local municipalities and power companies made numerous errors and did not act effectively to apply the excellent NWS forecasts.  For example, local utilities failed to de-energize power lines, leading to several fires.   The Los Angeles fire department did not pre-position firefighting resources in vulnerable areas, including the site of a recent fire that is now believed to have re-ignited.   A large water reservoir had been emptied for minor repairs and not refilled, leading to a lack of water for firefighting.  Finally, the evacuation from wildfire areas was disorganized and ineffective, a situation highlighted in a recent report for Los Angeles County.

Many More Cases

There are many other events with excellent forecasts and poor societal outcomes that could be noted.  

Skillfully forecast, Hurricane Sandy made landfall on the southern New Jersey coast on October 29, 2012, resulting in 254 deaths and an estimated $70 billion in economic loss, mainly from coastal flooding.  The February 2021 Midwest cold wave resulted in extensive power outages, as natural gas lines and wind turbines failed during a period of massive demand.   This skillfully predicted event led to 262 deaths, mainly from hypothermia and carbon monoxide poisoning, and $24 billion in economic loss. Hurricane Ian made landfall along the southwest Florida coast on September 28, 2022, as a Category 4 storm with 150-mph winds; a catastrophic storm surge caused the majority of the estimated 161 deaths.  Damage was at least $112 billion, making it the third costliest U.S. hurricane.   In 2024, Hurricane Helene brought a large storm surge and extensive wind damage to Florida and devastating flooding and landslides to mountain communities in Tennessee and North Carolina, resulting in at least 230 deaths and approximately $80 billion in economic loss. Well forecast days before.  There are many more events like this, but you get the point.

There is Much That Could Be Done

In my paper, I talk about specific actions that could be taken to greatly reduce loss of life and property from well-forecast weather events, including:

(1) The National Weather Service should reorganize its office structure to prioritize severe weather prediction and improve communication to local governments and responsible groups.  

(2) A National Disaster Review Board (NDRB), patterned after the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB), should review major weather and climate-related disasters and provide recommendations on specific steps for reducing loss of life and destruction.  

(3) Better use of direct satellite communication and expansion of NOAA Weather Radio could ensure that all Americans get timely warnings, no matter where they are.

Improved and rebuilt levees, New Orleans.

(4) Greater emphasis and resources must be provided to increase the resilience of homes, buildings, and infrastructure to extreme weather events, and increased priority should be given to educating the public about the nature of local extreme weather, how to monitor the risk, and the best approaches to dealing with such threats.

(5) Local governments need to greatly increase their coordination with the National Weather Service and better use weather forecasts to protect their citizens.

Don't get me wrong, improved weather prediction is already saving many lives and reducing property damage, but there is SO MUCH MORE we can do.

It is frustrating that the media spends so much time talking about loss of life from climate change, but never mentions that improved weather prediction and investments to improve resilience could reduce severe weather-related deaths and damage by 90% of more.

California and Oregon Have Been Getting More Precipitation Than Washington: Should We Care?

When it comes to precipitation along the West Coast, there are always winners and losers.   

Sometimes the jet stream, the conduit of storm systems, heads north into Washington and BC, and we are wet, while California is dry.

At other times, the jet stream heads southward to California, and they get the precipitation, and we are dry.

On relatively rare occasions, a huge ridge of high pressure covers the entire West Coast, so everyone is dry.

Over the past 60 days, we have generally had a pattern of dry north and wet south (see below).

This pattern has been particularly apparent over the past week, with central California getting hit particularly hard.

 

Thus, California has enjoyed the precipitation it needs to sustain agriculture and its large population... a very good thing. For example, all of California's reservoirs are all running above normal (see below), and the state's overall snowpack has increased substantially during the past month.

Why this recent precipitation distribution with wet California and a dry Northwest?  

Mainly, because we have recently seen a repeated pattern of a deep upper-level trough extending southward down the Coast, as shown by the upper-level flow pattern below (for Tuesday morning).

I should note that there is no reason to suggest that such patterns have anything to do with global warming.  The research is clear on this.    It is natural variability.

It is also clear that we expect the jet stream to move northward during late winter, and the atmospheric "fire hose" will return to our area.

What about the next few weeks?

The forecast precipitation total through next Wednesday, which I have some confidence in, shows moderately wet conditions from central CA to British Columbia, with the heaviest precipitation over southern Oregon.

Ensemble (many forecasts) from the US systems suggests around 30 inches of snowfall at Stampede Pass in the WA Cascades over the next week:

Beyond that period, forecast skill declines, but the major forecasting systems bring heavy precipitation into our region, so that the totals through early March get impressive over WA and BC (see below).

That also means a lot of snow in our mountains.

In short, I would not pay much attention to the gloom and doomers on social media and the climate change claims of some advocacy groups regarding our precipitation this year.  Reservoirs are in very good shape, and substantial precipitation can be expected during the next few weeks and months.

Modified Arctic Air Reaches the Northwest, Colder Air Is Yet to Come

The coldest air of the season has reached the Pacific Northwest, and some western Washington locations are already reporting precipitation in the form of ice pellets!

You can see the impact of the cold air on visible satellite imagery taken on Monday afternoon (see below).  As frigid cold air from Alaska and northern British Columbia moves over the warmer water of the Pacific, an unstable situation develops that produces cumulus convection......towering cumulus clouds with brief showers.

You can see the cumulus showers on the satellite image (white blobs with clear spaces between them), and they are aligned with the wind direction (red arrows).

Why does cold air moving over water produce showers?  

 Because it creates a large lapse rate, a change of temperature with height, that causes the atmosphere to convect, with upward motion producing clouds and precipitation.

You could see the convective showers coming onshore late Monday afternoon, as viewed by local weather radars:

As the atmosphere cooled and showers moved in, snow started to fall in the mountains, such as at  Hurricane Ridge at around 5000 ft in the Olympics. 

Late Monday afternoon, the freezing level was about 1600 ft in the Olympics, which means the snow level was roughly 600 ft.  It will decline further over the next few days.

During today (Tuesday) and Wednesday, very cold arctic air will push into southern British Columbia, with some of it leading into western Washington through the Fraser River valley.  

The situation Wednesday AM is shown below, with the purple and white colors indicating the coldest air.

Wow.  The Arctic will be getting very close to us.

A closer view on early Thursday AM (below) shows very cold temperatures over Washington...cold enough for lowland snow.  The only thing missing will be precipitation.

The latest UW model forecast showing predicted snowfall totals through Thursday morning does show some lowland snow from Tacoma southward.  Details uncertain, but there is a good chance that some lowland folks will see some flakes, with some localized minor accumulation.

Lowland snow will occur in the Willamette Valley as well, which is more isolated from the warming effects of the Pacific.

Finally, expect particularly cold air moving southwestward down the Fraser Valley into Bellingham.  This is illustrated by the ensemble of many high-resolution forecasts at Bellingham (below).  Temperatures will drop way below freezing.  Windy as well.  

Some wind chills may decline below 0F.  BRRR.

Light Lowland Snow Coming to Western Washington and Oregon

 I have held off talking about this until we were closer in time and uncertainty had declined, but there is a very good chance that some of you living in the western Washington and western Oregon lowlands will see some flakes on Tuesday and Wednesday.

I don't want to paint this as a snowy apocalypse, but there is a significant chance for some light snow, with marginal accumulation.

It won't be this bad

Let's begin with the latest UW WRF model snow forecasts. 

Let me be VERY clear about something. 

Snowfall is NOT the same as snow depth.  Snow melts on the surface and gets compressed.  Snow depth is generally MUCH less than snowfall.

The predicted snowfall total through Thursday morning is shown below.

The Olympics get hit hard, with much of the lowlands experiencing some flakes, including some bands of a few inches of wet flakes.  

Oregon will get even more snowy bounty with lots in the mountains and some accumulation in the southern Willamette Valley:

The lower-resolution European Model is similar, but has less snow over the western Washington lowlands.

When will the snow start, and what is the uncertainty in the forecasts?   

A good tool for answering these questions is ensembles of many forecasts.

The National Weather Service global model ensemble forecasts (below) for Bellingham are very generous with snow (I suspect too much). The gray lines show that the various solutions were all over the place (substantial uncertainty), with the highest resolution model indicated by blue (and the average of all the forecasts by black).   

Starts on Tuesday, with the greatest amounts on the 20th.

So what is going on?

As shown by the upper-level (500 hPa, about 18,000 ft) forecasts for late Monday, a strong trough of upper-level low pressure will move southward down our coast.

This is a well known as a cold pattern for our region.

As shown by the surface forecast for Wednesday morning, this will bring VERY cold air into British Columbia (purple colors, blue is cold enough to snow) and low pressure just east of Astoira.  

This configuration will pull cold air from Canada into northwest WA, particularly through the Fraser River Valley.

To illustrate, below are the predicted winds and temperatures on Thursday morning.  You can see the cold northwesterly flow coming out of Canada.

Give me the chills to look at it.

During the next few weeks, there will be substantial snow in the mountains, as shown by the predicted totals through March 2 (below).    

Hopefully, this bountiful snow will calm down some of the current panic in the media and social media about the current low snowpack.

Cold, Wet, and Snowy Period Ahead

 Get your umbrella handy, find those wool mittens, and look for your skis.....an extended period of cool, wet weather is ahead.

Let's start with the predicted precipitation (below).   The western U.S. is going to be very wet.

The predicted totals through next Tuesday afternoon are impressive, particularly over California.  But Washington and Oregon get their share.

The accumulated totals one week later are even more impressive, with the Northwest getting substantial amounts.

Temperatures will be colder than normal over the next ten days...from BC to southern California (blue and green colors indicate below normal temperatures)

Cold and wet means snow...and lots of it...for the entire West Coast.  Here are the totals through February 25th.  Let's say that skiers will have big smiles on their faces.  So will those concerned about snowpack.

What is producing this wet/cold/snowy bounty?

Answer:  a total reversal of the upper-level pattern, with troughing (low pressure) along the West Coast.

Sunday morning?   A strong, immense low off California.

Tuesday morning? An even stronger low off southern Oregon.

You will not believe what I will show you next.  Sunday evening on 22 February, a crazy strong low is STILL THERE.

The National Weather Service 8-14 day outlooks predict cold, wet conditions along the West Coast (see below).

Expect several feet of fresh snow in the Cascades and a radical improvement in the snowpack, with the reservoirs remaining in excellent shape.

What will the media, such as the Seattle Times Climate Lab, have to say about this reversal of the meteorological situation?  

I asked Grok to give me its best estimate of a future Seattle Times headline based on the current forecast. This is what it came up with:

Announcement

I will hold a special online Zoom session at 10 AM on Saturday for Patreon supporters.  Will answer questions and talk more about the snow situation.

Was January's Low Snowfall the Result of Global Warming? The Facts are Clear

As you can tell from my previous blog posts, I am really concerned about deliberately deceptive media stories and false information being distributed by certain groups.

Well, tall tale distributors have been working overtime recently, suggesting that the poor January snowpack over the Northwest is mainly the result of human-caused global warming.

These claims are demonstrably false.

Yesterday, the Seattle Times had a story, which stated:

The record-low snowpack is mostly due to how warm the West has been, which is connected to climate change from the burning of coal, oil, and natural gas, several scientists said.

Public Radio Station KUOW is on the same page as the Seattle Times, noting that:

With the global climate changing rapidly due to fossil fuel pollution, scientists say we should expect more warm winters like this one.

I could give you another dozen of these, but you get the drift:  global warming "advocates" are jumping all over the lack of mid-winter snowfall, claiming the warming from increasing CO2 concentrations gave us a dry, warm month that resulted in minimal snowfall.

It is easy to show that these claims are false.

The warm, dry January was produced by a very strong (and unusual) upper-level high-pressure area (see below), with colors indicating the difference from normal.  Red colors are crazy high pressure.

The location of this high pressure was in the perfect position to suppress Northwest snow, drying us out and forcing sinking and warming air.

There is no evidence that global warming causes more high-pressure systems in winter over the region.   

For example, climate model simulations don't predict them.

Would you like more proof?  Below is a plot of sea-level pressure on the Washington Coast over the last 30 years at Quillayute, on the northwest Washington coast.

No upward trend in high pressure in winter.

But I can disprove the global-warming explanation for the lack of January snow in other ways.

If we plot the January precipitation totals on the western slopes of the Cascades since the late 1800s (below), there is no long-term trend.  There would be if global warming were building high-pressure ridges more frequently over our region

What about temperature?  Below is a plot of temperature over the Cascades during the period that global warming has been most significant (since 1975) 

A slow increase by about 2F over the period, with several Januaries being warmer than this year (such as 1981).  This modest warming is NOT the explanation for this January's low snowfall.

Finally, to really put the global warming claims to rest, here are the April 1 snowpack totals over the Northwest mountains.  Only a minimal decline over time.

The bottom line is this:  the poor January snowpack over the region was predominantly associated with an unusual, persistent, high-pressure area over the region, not global warming.

The slowly warming planet is only a minor contributor to the snow deficit (perhaps 1-10% of the deficit).    

The claims by some of the media regarding the global warming origin of the poor January snow are more than disappointing; they represent deliberate misinformation.

Announcement

I will hold a special online Zoom session at 10 AM on Saturday for Patreon supporters.  Will answer questions and talk more about the snow situation.

Precipitation and Cooler Temperatures Return to the West Coast

The persistent ridge of high pressure over the western U.S., which brought generally dry conditions and less snowfall, is now history, with persistent low pressure and wet conditions taking its place.

Good news for those concerned about water resources in the West.

To get some perspective, the figure below shows the difference from normal precipitation over the past 90 days across the West Coast.

Near normal over much of western Washington and normal to wetter than normal over central and southern California.  But substantially drier than normal over western Oregon and northern CA.

A few days ago, the pattern shifted, and a plume of moisture moved into Oregon (see satellite image on Sunday)

The result has been healthy precipitation totals just where we needed them (see total for the past 48 hours below).   Some locations got more than 3 inches.

During the next week or so, one strong trough after another of low pressure will be moving into the West Coast, bringing rain and snow.

The maps below will show heights at 500 hPa (think of it as pressure at 18,000 ft) at various times during the next week or so.  Differences from normal are shown by colors (blue, lower than normal pressure, troughs;  red, higher than normal pressure, ridge).

Tomorrow at 4 PM.  Major trough to our south.

Next Monday, another strong trough of lower pressure

Thursday, 20 Feb.  ANOTHER strong trough

The Sunday after.....ANOTHER trough.

These troughs will bring a lot of water to the West Coast, with big stuff to our south, where they really need it. Only modest precipitation over Washington State.

Below is the UW model precipitation total through next Thursday.  Western Oregon and California will be sodden.   We will only get wet. Really heavy precipitation over the Sierra Nevada.

The latest NOAA Climate Prediction Center 8-14 day forecast is for cooler than normal and wetter than normal conditions over the western U.S 

It appears that this pattern shift has staying power, and the water/snow situation over the western U.S. should improve substantially during the next few weeks.