Rose Festival Low Approaching?

Friday, June 01, 2007


NOWCAST - What a week we have had weather wise! fair skies and sunshine and hot temperatures actually. It took a little while to get going Tuesday, but nice since. A few morning clouds today and then sunshine and cooler but hot Saturday with highs near 90 degrees again. A good chance of thunderstorms Saturday or early Sunday then next week is, umm, well, a typical Rose Festival week.

OUTCAST -The Rose Festival Low, is always one of the weather forecaster's biggest nightmare. This is a time when the Portland area has its largest celebration and this year will be the 100 year anniversary. Very important weather forecasts coming up this week indeed. I'm sure way back a century ago, it did not take too many years of observing the weather during this event and associating the weather forecast to discover that often a rather persistent low pressure system would conveniently park itself off the Oregon and Washington coast and produce clouds and drizzle and sometimes downpours.

The actual weather during the Grand Floral Parade has fared a bit better than some of the other rose events with the usual morning clouds and afternoon sunshine. According to the National Weather Service office in Portland here are a few statistics for the parade day based on data from 1955-2006: 30 cloudy days, 3 partly cloudy days, 10 sunny days, and 14 rainy days. The average parade start temperature is 64 degrees with light northwest winds. The chance of precipitation stands at 36 percent.

Do I see folks with stocking caps, blankets, and heavy sweatshirts in this 2004 photograph (right)? Yep. The temperatures were only in the 50's.

Oh well, I guess every event has its highs and lows. In this case we will look past the low part. Think sun!!


Summer Begins! Today is the first day of summer for us weather and climate folks. We consider the months of Jane, July, and August as summer. Forget the calendar. It is also the start of the fire season on private and state lands so be very careful with campfires and off road activities! It could be a wild summer.










-- posted by Pat Timm @ 12:01 AM,

0 Comments:

Post a Comment

<< Home