The Gorge is my Gym

Thank you for using this forecast! It’s free to use, but it’s not free for me to write. I put about an hour a day into creating a (hopefully) accurate forecast, and I pay for the hosting on this website. If you find this service valuable (gets you the good days on the mountain, saves you gas and time, etc.) please donate. I’m just one gal with other jobs writing this for you! Your generosity keeps this going for everyone. I also send an email version of this forecast. Make a $12 or larger donation, and you’re on the email list for a year. No dealing with the twice-yearly pledge drive. You’ll also have a chance to win prizes from the sponsors, when I have prizes to give. Thank you again for your support!

Mt. Hood Snow Forecast – 5000′
	4a-8a	8a-12p	12p-4p	4p-8p	8p-4a
Monday
Tuesday
Wednesday

Good morning,

Oh… my head hurts… this is a hard forecast. Let’s get the easy part out of the way first: Gorge weather. Today will be cloudy in the western Gorge, but the further east you go, the sunnier it will be. The gradient is already W .10, and it’s going to get bigger. Expect west wind at 22-26+ from Hood River to Stevenson this morning, with 26-30 further east. This afternoon, west wind picks up to 32-40 from Hood River to Maryhill. Looks like the eastern Gorge won’t be quite as windy until after dark, when it will blow 35+ from Rowena east to Arlington. Do not leave your garbage cans out today or tonight!

Tomorrow starts off with west wind at 32-40 from Hood River to Maryhill, backing off to 26-30 in the afternoon from Stevenson to Maryhill. It should be mostly cloudy in the western Gorge tomorrow and sunny out east.

So, you probably know that there’s tons of moisture headed to the mountains. That’s mostly orographically driven, so strong rain shadows should protect Portland and the central/east Gorge from the bulk of the precip.

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Now, on to the mountains. Today’s a pretty easy call: Snow level at 1000′ early, rising to 2000′ in the afternooon. Dumping snow all day – models say .5” water value (WV), but I suspect we’ll see a lot more with the strength of the NW wind. Call it .5-.8” for 6-10” of new by 4pm. The precip rate increases dramatically after 4pm, with 2” WV by Tuesday morning, for 18-24” of new snow overnight. Wind today will be WNW 40 early, 35-40 midday, and WNW 50+ overnight. That’s going to make chairs run slowly, if at all.

Tomorrow looks much worse for chairs running, sadly, meaning slightly-protected Skibowl’s got the best shot of you accessing all that new snow. As of yesterday, it looked like warmer air was going to move in early Tuesday. Now it looks like it will happen later, which is a darn good thing. So, expect .7-1.0” WV Tuesday between 4am and 4pm, for 8-10” of new snow. However, the weather is going to start warming around 1pm, with warmer air moving in above (more on that in a bit)… Anyway, it doesn’t much matter, as the chances of any lifts running are minimal with the incoming wind: WNW 60 at 1am, NW 50 at 7am, NNW 45-55 at 10am, not dropping until 4pm, when it goes to NNW 45.

Okay, so back to the incoming warmer air. As I said yesterday, this is a really strange setup, with tropical air headed north around a blocking high, and then headed back south into the Cascades. I’ve never seen it before… So, warmer air comes over top of the colder air below, and by 4pm, models are showing the freezing level at 6000′. This means we’ll likely see a switch from snow to freezing rain sometime between 1pm and 4pm.

The snow level will fluctuate a bit Tuesday night, but by 4am, the temp will be -1°C at 8000′. This suggests to me that we’ll see freezing rain overnight Tuesday through Wednesday evening, when the snow level finally drops back to 5500′. If I’m right, Wednesday will be miserable. If I’m wrong, and we can hope for that, because I’d rather be wrong than right in this case, we get .7” WV Tuesday night for 5-7” of new by Wednesday morning, followed by .8” during the day Wednesday for 5-7” of new. Another .3” falls Wednesday evening, after which there will be a few more flurries followed by clear sky Thursday.

The extended forecast predicts warmer, dry weather through the weekend.

Have an awesome day today!

Temira

Thank you for using this forecast! It’s free to use, but it’s not free for me to write. I put about an hour a day into creating a (hopefully) accurate forecast, and I pay for the hosting on this website. If you find this service valuable (gets you the good days on the mountain, saves you gas and time, etc.) please donate. I’m just one gal with other jobs writing this for you! Your generosity keeps this going for everyone. I also send an email version of this forecast. Make a $12 or larger donation, and you’re on the email list for a year. No dealing with the twice-yearly pledge drive. You’ll also have a chance to win prizes from the sponsors, when I have prizes to give. Thank you again for your support!

Mt. Hood Snow Forecast – 5000′
	4a-8a	8a-12p	12p-4p	4p-8p	8p-4a
Sunday
Monday
Tuesday

Good morning,

I spent yesterday working on the mountain, and got back to town around 4pm. Wow… it was such a nice afternoon in the valley! Today’s Gorge weather should be sunbreaky in the morning, with rain moving in during the afternoon. Wind today will be west 20-24 or so. Tomorrow should bring pouring rain to Cascade Locks with sharply decreasing rain amounts the further east you go. Wind will be west 26-30 tomorrow morning, picking up to 30-35+ late in the afternoon with the strongest wind at Doug’s and Maryhill. Tuesday looks similar, with rain west, showers central, and sun east, with west wind at 26-30. Columbia River temp is 38°.

There’s some really interesting weather headed our way early this week. It’s an atmospheric river (aka Pineapple Express), but it’s taking the long route here (which should cool it down a bit and sap some of the precipitable water). There’s a big high pressure system off the coast, and the tropical moisture is going to head north around it, and then plummet south, slamming straight into the northern Oregon Cascades and the Washington Cascades. More on this in a bit. I know it’s probably not that interesting to you, but it’s a very unusual setup, and I’m excited to see what happens!

Today on Mt. Hood sees the snow level at 1000′, with flurries and sunbreaks through 4pm. Heavier snowfall picks up mid-afternoon, with .7-.8” water value (WV) overnight, for 7-9” of new snow by 4am Monday. Wind today will be NW 20-30 early, W 25-30 midday and NW 30-40 overnight.

Monday morning starts with the snow level around 1000′. Moderate snowfall continues through noon, becoming very heavy after noon. We’ll get 1” WV by 4pm, for 11-13” of new snow. Another 1.7” falls by 4am Tuesday, but it looks like the temps will be relatively warm despite the low snow level, giving us 14-18” of heavy, wind-affected new snow. Wind on Monday is going to be a problem, with WNW 30-40 early, NW 40-50 by 7am, W 45-55 by 1pm, and WNW 60+ by 4pm. Best of luck to the folks in charge of keeping chairs running. I have a feeling they won’t succeed.

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The wind looks even worse on Tuesday, and that’ll be nothing compared to the nasty weather. The snow level starts at 3000′, but warm air moving in above will likely give the mountains either freezing rain or really wet snow. The snow level rises to 5500′ at 7am and 6000′ by 10am, dropping a bit in the afternoon to 3000′. However, when the snow level drops, warm air above will keep the temp right around 0 degrees at 7500′, meaning we’ll probably see freezing rain in the afternoon. As for precip totals, expect 1-1.5” between 4am and 4pm and another 1.4-1.7” by 4am Wednesday. That’s going to give us feet and feet of snow up high, but the precip type is going to be marginal for snow accumulation down low. Wind on Tuesday will ensure most lifts don’t run, and it will ensure that the snow that does fall is extremely wind-affects: WNW 60 during the morning drops to a still-disruptive NW 45-50 around 10am, and stays that way all day. That’s going to be really problematic if we see freezing rain, because chairs won’t be running to keep the equipment from icing up.

Wednesday starts out with the snow level at 6000′, dropping to 4000′ by 1pm and 3500′ by 7pm. A snow/rain mix in the morning gives us .4” WV by 4pm, for a couple inches of new snow. After that, flurries alternate with sunbreaks. Wind on Wednesday will be NW 45-50 early, WNW 35-40 mid-afternoon, and NW 25-30 in the evening.

It looks like high pressure may rebuild after Wednesday, drying things out.

Have an awesome day today!

Temira