Thursday morning sees wet, moderate temperatures in Spokane

On the third day of morning snow, our weather gave to thee: temperatures above freezing, slush on the sidewalks, and a car that drove over a tree.

According to witnesses and police, a woman slammed into a large piece of shrubbery in the YMCA parking lot on North Monroe Street early Thursday morning, her car catapulting onto another vehicle in the parking lot. The woman was not injured, and the other car was unoccupied.

“She stepped on the gas instead of the breaks,” said Officer Ken Applewhaite as a tow truck removed the damaged sedan. “She launched herself onto another car. That’s it.”

Elsewhere in Spokane, motorists had to clear a little less than an inch of wet, slushy snow off their cars before braving the roads, where they found bare and wet concrete and asphalt.

“The road temperatures are actually pretty high,” said National Weather Service Meteorologist Bob Tobin. “We’re not getting a whole lot of accumulation.”

From about 4 a.m. to right around 7:30 a.m., the region experienced a light snow shower that quickly turned to rain as temperatures hovered in the mid 30s. Thanks to warmer temperatures Wednesday night that didn’t dip below freezing, roads stayed warm enough to turn pesky snow flakes into water fairly quickly.

Further north, some areas experienced as much as an inch that stuck around in places, while further east, Coeur d’Alene was continuing to experience snow fall as late as 9 a.m. Thursday.

Tobin said this week’s weather is a signal for times to come. Wet, sloppy, slushy conditions for the foreseeable future, including the weekend.

“It’s going to stay active and unsettled,” he said. “We will see rain and snow mix for some time.”