Ramblings of a Graduate Student

I have previously discussed that the Winter Olympics this year were hurting for snow.  This winter is almost the worst case scenario for the Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada, the host city for the Winter Olympics in the 29th Olympiad.  In fact, the Olympic organizers are having to cancel the general admission tickets for some outdoor sports because of unsafe conditions in the standing room only areas.  This is after warm, heavy rains washed away more than a foot of snow on the mountain and made conditions unsafe for spectators.  This is typics during an El Nino winter – the Pacific Northwest of the United States and the southwest portion of Canada tend to be warmer and drier than normal.  This doesn’t mean that there is no precipitation, but it does mean that what little precipitation (compared to normal) tends to have a greater chance of falling as rain.  This appears to be the case this winter.

Tonight’s image is from the Hydrometeorological Prediction Center (HPC).  It is a forecast of where the middle troposphere highs and lows will be 84 hours into the future (essentially Thursday evening).  To a meteorologist, whenever the middle troposphere has a high (labeled with an H), this often means warm, dry conditions.  Notice that there is an H centered over southwest Canada.  This means that over the next few days, at least, we would expect to find (relatively) warm temperatures across this portion of North America.  Looking at forecasts for southwest British Columbia, it appears that temperatures in the mid 40s are expected throughout the week.  This will continue to melt snow and prevent new snow from falling.  If this forecast verifies, it doesn’t look good for those hoping conditions improve for the Olympics.