Office of the State Climatologist of Oregon @laoneill25 - housed at Oregon State University @OSUCEOAS! Oregon climate, weather, and impacts.
Corvallis, OR
Joined July 2010
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The latest reservoir storage numbers are in for Oregon, and ... we're doing pretty well overall, especially compared with the last 4 years! The outlier is Cougar Reservoir, which has substantially altered operations in 2022 to increase flows on the mainstem Willamette.
Oregon Climate Office retweeted
Western Oregon was hit by a "flash drought" over the past 2-3 weeks, according to OR State Climatologist @laoneill25. Warm temps and east winds “sucked record amounts of moisture from the soil." Impact to farming, drinking water, wildfire, etc. Story:
tinyurl.com/tsy9kn3p
Oregon Climate Office retweeted
🔵 Since January 1, much of Arizona and New Mexico have observed normal to well-above-normal precipitation levels. Dry conditions expanded in western Oregon and Washington in response to short-term dryness and very low streamflows. bit.ly/USDM042324 #DroughtMonitor
ALT U.S. Drought Monitor West map for April 23, 2024.
Although signals point to drought development, the good news is that most of Oregon's reservoirs are doing fairly well this spring. Good reservoir storage cannot mitigate all drought impacts, but it can provide valuable water supply during a dry summer.
Way back in April 11, 1904, Oregon had one of its warmest April days on record, with 80s and 90s in western Oregon. The map shows the daily highs available then. These types of hot days typically occur during offshore wind events with a strong high pressure ridge to the north.
Oregon Climate Office retweeted
Why and how do non-native invasive plants contribute to wildfire risk? OCCRI director @efleishman discusses with Time magazine. time.com/6305735/invasive-pl… @OSUCEOAS
Western Oregon is headed for a heat wave over the next week that is forecast to be intense and long. Will it be historic? Short answer, yes, but not like June 2021. 1/
Oregon Climate Office retweeted
April was a much wetter and cooler month after record to near-record dry and warm conditions from early January into early April. Learn more in Oregon's May Water Supply Outlook Report: bit.ly/37lC2vQ #snowsurvey
ALT Brock Phillips, USBR Physical Scientist, prepares to take a snow core sample along the Park H.Q. Snow Course in Crater Lake National Park. Snowpack at the site was 69% of median. (Photo taken April 28, 2022: Chris Gebauer, NRCS Soil Scientist)
Reservoirs in NW Oregon boosted by a wet April and good snowpack, but those elsewhere are doing poorly. In those areas, storage levels are critically low and well below storage levels at this time last year. #ordrought #drought #orwx
Oregon Climate Office retweeted
Great to see @CoCoRaHS highlighted in one of the nation's top newspapers. washingtonpost.com/science/2…
Oregon Climate Office retweeted
❄️☔️📹A lot of folks are curious about how much precipitation and snowpack we've received, how this affects the current drought, and whether this pattern will continue. We address these questions in our latest video update.
#orwx #cawx
youtu.be/y0N8HRY8WIs
Oregon Climate Office retweeted
“I think the real story here is that we used to get snow more often in April in Portland and now we don’t.” opb.org/article/2022/04/13/s…
The trend in Portland, OR is for fewer days with min temperatures at or below freezing. This shows a time series of the # of sub-freezing days/year at the Portland Airport since 1940. Avg was about 40-45 sub-freezing days/yr in the 1940's, and now ~30 days/yr, a reduction of >20%
