Local News

Lyon Creek along Bothell Way Northeast in Lake Forest Park was swelling this morning due to heavy rains overnight and this morning. Rain is in the forecast for the rest of today. (Photo by Mike Siegel / The Seattle Times)

A distraction from the rain:
A bloody hand print that sticks to surfaces, like the front door of Champion Party Supply near Lower Queen Anne. (Photo by Ken Lambert / The Seattle Times)

Hey, kids:  You may want to work up Halloween costumes that include boots and a parka.

Not only did the Seattle area set a rain record on Tuesday, but we’re going to get wetter as the day goes on.

“We could get about another third of an inch of rain by about 8 p.m.,” said Andy Haner of the Weather Service.

Seattle-Tacoma International Airport recorded 1.36 inches of rain Tuesday, besting the old record of .87 inches set in 1997.

Expect more showers Thursday, at least in the morning, but the chance of a glimpse of sun in the afternoon. Friday is looking dry, before showers come back into the picture.

By now, the dry streak that began in late July and continued into this month may be just a memory.  Consider this bit of weather trivia: Even though the first 11 days of October were dry, we’ve had 6.14 inches of rain since then, compared to a normal total of 3.48 inches for the entire month.

Related: Soggy commute leaves motorists enduring a long drive to work

Did someone say early spring?

The temperature hit 62 at Weather Service offices in Seattle’s Sand Point neighborhood Friday afternoon as the Puget Sound area got its warmest day of the year so far, said meteorologist Dennis D’Amico.

Seattle-Tacoma International, where the city’s official readings are taken, topped out at a more conservative 58 degrees, but also achieved it high for the year.

And the sunshine is expected to stick around, with no rain in the forecast until a chance of showers returns Tuesday night.

Forecast highs at the airport are 55 on Saturday, 54 on Sunday, 57 on Monday and 50 on Tuesday. Sea-Tac’s normal high temperature in early February is 49.

Uh, oh, the city is preparing for snow this weekend. Does that mean it actually could snow? (Many of you would like that, based on our poll from yesterday.)

This is from a statement put out by Marybeth Turner with Seattle’s Department of Transportation:

The Seattle Department of Transportation (SDOT) will have Street Maintenance crews on standby for snow response this weekend and early next week due to a forecast of possible snow showers below 500 feet.

Throughout this week Street Maintenance crews have been treating areas prone to roadway frost and ice to improve conditions for drivers, and will continue this operation while nighttime temperatures remain low. SDOT will also continue to carefully monitor weather forecasts.

You can also keep abreast of events by using the city’s new SnowWatch Web site.

The city reminds residents and businesses to keep their sidewalks free of ice and snow for pedestrian safety. More information about SDOT’s winter storm strategy, including a map of streets that will be treated during a storm, please visit this city website.

We took a look at the 5-day forecasts — specifically the overnight temperatures — from six organizations: KING, KIRO, KOMO, AccuWeather, the National Weather Service and The Seattle Times, and all of them, except maybe us, tell the same story: It’s going to be rather cold.

That means in the low 30s, and if you believe AccuWeather, it could be in the upper 20s on a few nights.

Think gloves, window scraping, icy streets, you got it.

We thought it might be fun to list who says what on the low temps, so we made a chart.

Oh, and bundle up.

Surprise, surprise: It’ll be a wet Thanksgiving for Western Washington.

Meteorologists are predicting between a quarter inch and half an inch of rain in Seattle on Thursday, starting at about noon and continuing through the night. Winds are expected to reach up to 25 mph, said Doug McDonnal of the National Weather Service.

The high temperature will be 45 degrees.

Meanwhile, the mountains will see “pretty significant snow,” McDonnal said. The snow level will be about 2,000 feet. Between eight and 20 inches is expected, depending on the location, with the heaviest at Mt. Baker and Mt. Rainier.

“Anyone driving into the mountains or across the mountains is definitely going to run into snow,” McDonnal said.

Winds out of the south will be the main concern on the coast and north of Seattle. Speeds are expected to range between 25 and 30 mph, with gusts of up to 55 mph.

For the first time in more than a year, there was no major bad news in the state forecast of tax collections.

The state’s chief economist, Arun Raha, projects the state will collect $122 million less in taxes than had been forecast between now and June 2013.

But state officials say that’s expected to be offset by a drop in caseloads – the number of people using state services, such as health care for the poor.

Simply put: The existing $2 billion crater in the state budget has gotten no deeper.

In an economic report earlier this month, Raha indicated things had seemed to level off, saying, “Two months have passed since the September forecast, and nothing has gone off the rails.”

But he also noted at the time, “It is premature to stop worrying about the future.”

By early afternoon Friday, a wet and blustery storm was making its way across Western Washington, as promised.

Seattle-Tacoma International Airport was recording wind gusts approaching 30 mph at 1 p.m., while Port Angeles was recording gusts of 35 mph.

Mixed rain-and-snow were falling in the Stevens and Snoqualmie Pass areas, expected to switch to just snow within hours, and building up to 6 to 11 inches over the next couple of days.

In  the Seattle area, both the wind and the rain are expected to diminish by 4 p.m., but the weekend is still looking soggy. Seattle’s forecast calls for a 100 percent chance of rain on Saturday, dropping to 50 percent on Sunday.

Yes, it happens every year, but it always comes as a surprise. Temperatures in the Seattle area are forecast to dip into the 30s tonight for the first time since spring.

And if you head east across Stevens Pass on Monday, you may see a bit of snow at the summit,  and as far east as Leavenworth.

For colder cold, head to the Columbia Basin in Southeast Washington, where the season’s first freeze is expected to drop temperatures into the 20s Monday night in areas including Yakima and the Tri-Cities, says a Weather Service freeze warning.