‘Thank you rain,’ and ‘I can breathe.’ Tacoma residents react to long-awaited rainfall

It’s not often that you’ll hear Pacific Northwest residents complain that there is not enough rain. But the region had a unusually dry summer and autumn. In fact, it has been the driest since the 1940s, according to the National Weather Service.

In addition, despite being past the official end of a less active wildfire season, smoke has been lingering and stagnating in the region over the last couple of weeks.

Thursday overnight and early Friday did bring with it some much-needed winds and precipitation. More significant rainfall is expected later Friday, as early as 6 p.m. in some areas. The National Weather Service radar showed most of Western Washington under clouds of precipitation as of late Friday morning.

Even though this is the time of year that area residents usually begin to get their yards and homes ready for winter, this year seems to have caused some disorientation.

“I took my dog outside and at first I didn’t know what the noise was, turned out to be raindrops hitting leaves,” commented one user on a popular Tacoma sub-Reddit post.

Other reactions ranged from relief to jubilation.

“Yes, hallelujah! Rain. Good old wet, grey temperate rain! It’s been a while,” commented another Reddit user.

Some were more focused on safety warnings and reminders.

“The first round of rain is gonna be some nasty bong water. I wouldn’t frolic outside just yet,” commented another user.

Another user added to those warnings with a reminder about what some roads might be like on the morning commute.

“Be extra careful when driving the next few days. Will be extra slippery with all the built up oil,” the user noted.

As of about 9 a.m. on Friday morning, WSDOT real-time traffic cameras at the I-5 interchange near East 27th Street in Tacoma showed that the roads were still mostly dry and traffic was moving normally.

The sense of relief was also on display on Twitter, as Tacoma residents expressed their reactions: