As Punxsutawney showed, winter isn’t quite finished

Our weather pattern here in the Inland Northwest continues to be one of milder-than-normal temperatures with much of the precipitation falling as rain in the lower elevations. However, there was some snow Sunday, with slightly more than an inch measured at the airport.

So far this season, Spokane has reported 15.7 inches of snow compared to a normal of about 35 inches. And January was 1.5 degrees warmer than normal as the average temperature was 31 degrees.

The next series of storm systems, for the most part, will fall as rain in the lower elevations. Unfortunately, it may be mild enough for rain rather than snow in the mountains as well.

While the water temperatures in the south-central Pacific Ocean have returned to normal, we still have a lot of warmer than normal sea-surface temperatures off the West Coast, which is probably contributing to the milder weather in the West and the frigid temperatures in the East.

The long-range computer forecast models are pointing to another blast of frigid air from the north over the central U.S. toward the end of next week. Once again, there will be sub-freezing temperatures in the northern and central Great Plains and Midwest. The Northeast, however, will likely see more snow showers, and snow could fall all the way down into Georgia and the Carolinas, especially over Valentine’s Day weekend.

This pattern is caused by the strong high in the West pushing the colder air to the east of our region. I still think we’ll see a few more storms with snow from mid-February through early March, but spring should arrive earlier than usual.