Brace for bone-chilling weather headed our way and maybe, just maybe, snow
The odds have changed for the coming winter blast about to descend on Tacoma and the Puget Sound lowlands: Less snow, more cold.
The National Weather Service in Seattle said Wednesday that Tacoma would probably get only 1 inch of snow from Thursday through Saturday. But it left the door open to as little as 0.3 inches and as much as 11 inches.
Meanwhile, the low in Tacoma will hit 17 Friday night.
The snow
Olympia could see more snow than Tacoma, but just 3 inches Thursday-Saturday, according to the NWS. The range there: zero to 14 inches.
Why the huge range? Too many variables, NWS meteorologist Jacob DeFlitch said. There’s still going to be lingering moisture from a weather system in the area as cold air comes down from Canada.
“It’s really hard to pinpoint where showers are going to be,” DeFlitch said. “So we do have the chance of snow or rain snow mix during that period.”
The cold
Snow or no snow, freezing air will begin flowing into western Washington on Thursday from British Columbia’s Fraser River Valley, DeFlitch said.
Thursday’s high will be 43 but the low will drop to 25.
On Friday, the mercury won’t rise above freezing before dipping back to 17. Saturday’s high will be 26.
Sunday’s high will be 31 with a low of 19. On Monday, Martin Luther King Jr. Day, the high will barely get above freezing. Below freezing lows should continue all week.
