Snow Expected Wednesday: Cold Continues

 National Weather Service Special Weather Statement for Whatcom County: Snow expected in the lowlands on Wednesday......Cold weather in store for the remainder of the week...

Snow is forecast for the lowlands of Western Washington Wednesday. A Developing weather system along the northern British Columbia Coast Tuesday will move south over Western Washington and into Whatcom County on Wednesday. This system will draw moist air off the ocean which Will override the cold air mass in place over Western Washington Producing snow. At this point...it is difficult to say how much snow this system will produce. Small changes in the track of the System can effect the amount of snow over the area greatly.

Cold arctic air will remain over Western Washington this week.Daytime highs will have a hard time getting above freezing and nighttime lows could drop into the single digits in some places.Record lows have already been set for today. Previous cold spells this time of year will make the record lows harder to break for the next couple of days. The following is a table of record low temperatures for the upcoming week.

        Seattle    Olympia    Bellingham   Hoquiam    Quillayute

15th  20/1964 *   17/1967     2/1964      25/1967    21/1967
16th  10/1964      5/1964    -1/1964      16/1964    21/2005
17th  11/1964      3/1964     6/1964      17/1964    21/1987
18th  18/1964     13/2005    15/1984      25/1984    21/2005
19th  17/1990     15/1984    12/1990      21/1990    18/1984
20th  14/1990      4/1990    11/1990      16/1990    18/1998

* Record broken this morning

Since 1990 the low temperature at Seattle-Tacoma airport has Dropped to 15 degrees or less only twice...January 30, 1996 and December 20,1998. Both days the low was 15 degrees. In December 1990 the low temperature at Seattle tacoma airport dropped to 15 degrees or less on 5 days.The record for consecutive days with highs freezing or below at Seattle-Tacoma airport is 10 set january 21-30, 1969. Here Is a list of the top five streaks of high temperatures freezing or below at Seattle Tacoma airport.

1. 10 days January 21-30, 1969
2.  9 days December 4-12, 1972
3.  7 days January 27 to February 2, 1950
4.  7 days January 12-18, 1950
5.  6 days December 19-24, 1990

In January 1950 the average daily high temperature for the month was 30.7 degrees. This is the only month in the official Seattle Weather records that the average daily high temperature was below freezing.

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