Weathercatch: How do we love thee weather? Let us count the ways

Despite the Inland Northwest being in the depths of the coldest temperatures of the season, there’s a lot to love about our region’s weather as Valentine’s Day approaches:

– High-impact snowstorms aren’t common and blizzards are flat-out rare. In fact, the last blizzard to strike our region was in January 1950, when 4 feet of snow fell in the Spokane area and North Idaho, accompanied by frigid temperatures and strong winds that lasted almost three weeks. It’s highly unusual for us to experience prolonged periods of extreme cold as we did that year.

– Hurricanes don’t strike and tornadoes rarely. Even severe thunderstorms are few.

– We don’t get waterlogged. Our region receives far less precipitation than the state’s West Side. Spokane gets 16 inches annually, compared with Seattle’s average of 38 inches. For this we can thank the Cascade Range, which helps keep heavy rain systems from reaching the eastern half of the state.

– We don’t have humid summers. Humidity, or the concentration of water vapor in the air, can make the air feel steamy and hotter than it actually it is. Also, tornadoes and thunderstorms thrive in environments with high humidity. What makes our climate so comfortably semiarid? The Pacific waters off Washington’s coast are cold, thereby producing less water vapor in the air than the Gulf of Mexico’s warm waters. Also, moisture-infused air tends to dissipate as it moves eastward across the Cascade mountains.

– Our summer nights aren’t stifling hot. In a meteorological phenomenon known as the diurnal shift, temperatures go from hot during the day to pleasantly cooler at night. A high of 90 degrees at 4 p.m. could give way to a low of 65 at 4 a.m. These temperature fluctuations are largely caused by our geography and dry climate. Places located at sea level with high humidity levels see smaller temperature drops at nighttime than the Inland Northwest because water-vapor laden air is more resistant to temperature changes than dry air.

Now, back to this week’s notable cold temperatures – following an exceptionally mild opening of 2021. Why a big weather change? It’s the result of a large Arctic air mass that plunged into the Midwest and Northern Plains last weekend and spilled into the Pacific Northwest a few days later. The core of this cold system brought subzero temperatures with wind chills reaching 20-30 degrees below zero to parts of Wisconsin, Minnesota and South Dakota. Fortunately for us, it toned down as it spread our way. Sure, it’s cold, but nothing like Minneapolis, where the high temperature on Sunday was minus 4.

With that, we’ll close our column with a look at how Spokane fared on some Valentine’s Days past:

• 2020: Temperatures ran above normal with a high of 45 degrees and a low of 31. No rain or snow but some wind gusts up to 29 mph.

• 2019: Temperatures ran below normal with a high of 33 degrees and a low of 15. A total of 1.5 inches of snow fell and wind gusts reached 22 mph.

• 2018: 7.3 inches of snow fell, shattering the record of 4 inches for that date set in 1923.

• 2017: Talk about sweet – the day was sunny and calm, with highs reaching almost 50 degrees.

• 2014: A light morning rain gave way to clear skies and highs in the upper 40s.

• 1923: The high temperature only reached 10 degrees and 4 inches of snow fell.

• 1884: Minus 12 degrees.