A Very Wet March

This March has been very wet over the western side of Washington State.

How wet?  Read on.

At Bellingham (through March 29), it has been the wettest March of ALL TIME....going back to 1950... with roughly 6.5 inches.

No wonder that the I5 is closed just south of Bellingham due to landslides:

Seattle has had the sixth-wettest March since the late 1940s (below).  This is in stark contrast to the past several years.

The latest NOAA soil moisture analysis indicates that western Washington has the highest soil moisture in the nation.

What about the difference from normal of our current soil moisture?  Are these values unusual?  The following map shows the differences from normal (in mm).  Western Washington and the Cascades have wetter-than-normal soils.  

Tuesday will be dry, but another wet system will come in on Wednesday and early Thursday.

The forecast total through Friday morning shows substantial precipitation across the region, with the heaviest amounts exactly where they are needed over western Oregon.

And this system will be cool enough that substantial snow will fall over the Oregon Cascades, where it is really needed.

Good news for water resources and for those who like it damp: