Chilly, soggy holiday weekend to give way to warmer weather coming in days ahead
It’s turned out to be a chilly and drippy Memorial Day holiday weekend for Tacoma and the area, on track to become the second-wettest May on record, with two more days to go for record keeping.
We’re also on track for this to be the seventh coldest May, according to meteorologist Dustin Guy with the National Weather Service office in Seattle.
The area has recorded 3.79 inches of rain this month; only May 1948 saw three-quarters of an inch more rain, he noted, based on Sea-Tac Airport’s records going back to 1945.
“I guess people have been phrasing it the wettest May since the Truman administration. It’s been awhile,” he said.
Cooler temperatures also have been a part of the soggy spring.
“Right now we’re averaging 5 degrees below normal for the average high temperature,” Guy said. “Normal by this point in the month is about 57.4. And we’ve observed so far this month 52.4 for the average temperature.”
The coldest Memorial Day on record for the area was 49 degrees in 1980, also a little more than a week after the Mount St. Helens eruption.
But as we know, summer-like weather can be upon us in an instant; in this case as soon as Tuesday.
“We’ll probably be 10 degrees warmer, perhaps at least eight or 10 degrees, somewhere in that vicinity tomorrow and then Wednesday, we’ll bump up a few more degrees,” Guy said. “So we’re in the neighborhood of 68 to 70 tomorrow then mid-70s for Wednesday, and it will start to cool off for the second half of the week.”
But he added, “the good news is it’s not going to be one of these really drastic cool spells like we’ve had. It’ll cool off into the upper 60s probably mid 60s by next weekend.”
That doesn’t help much for those seeking a drier, warmer Memorial Day around the grill.
However, if you wanted some early-Memorial Day rays, the view above the clouds at Mount Rainier was indeed sunny.
The National Weather Service’s Seattle office posted on social media a view of the scene above the clouds from 10,000 feet on the mountain Monday morning.
This story was originally published May 30, 2022 at 11:03 AM.
