Catastrophic flooding in Western Washington State.

[Yvonne Smith]

They called it an “atmospheric river”, which is apparently really wet clouds, and the jet stream put it right into the Seattle area, and then just stopped , so the rain keeps coming down over the same areas, and flooding all of the rivers, as well as snow on the mountains.
Many of the main freeways in the western part of the state are shut down in some areas, whole towns are being evacuated, and all the way from Oregon to the Canadian border is having floods .
I have a lot of family out there, so I have been checking with them to see if they are all okay, and so far, they are. More rain is expected in the area, and it has affected rivers all the way across the state, although not as bad as it is in the western half of the state.

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[Jacob Petersheim]

These happen now and then. I think it's a pretty well-known thing that gets more attention under the new name nw.

We've had them extend here before, both from the Pacific and the Gulf. It seems to involve a large amount of moisture that travels relatively high and then mostly drops a long way from the source. The last really big one I can recall had us bailing out the basement, trying to keep up and losing, for about 48 hours and the house ended up as a island. Next door that lot grade was about 5 feet lower and they did not fare as well.

We actually did ok until the ground saturated all the way down and water began flooding up through the sump pump crock. If power had failed... no telling how deep it may have gotten down there.

Hopefully people there are hanging on, or getting out where things are really bad. These things are Hell to live through, people can get very worn out fighting and trying to handle it all.

 

[Don Alaska]

They called it an “atmospheric river”, which is apparently really wet clouds, and the jet stream put it right into the Seattle area, and then just stopped , so the rain keeps coming down over the same areas, and flooding all of the rivers, as well as snow on the mountains.
Many of the main freeways in the western part of the state are shut down in some areas, whole towns are being evacuated, and all the way from Oregon to the Canadian border is having floods .
I have a lot of family out there, so I have been checking with them to see if they are all okay, and so far, they are. More rain is expected in the area, and it has affected rivers all the way across the state, although not as bad as it is in the western half of the state.

Travel Center Map | WSDOT

The map provides traffic flow, travel alerts, cameras, weather conditions, mountain pass reports, rest areas and commercial vehicle restrictions.

wsdot.com

We get atmospheric rivers here as well. In the summer they bring rain and in the winter it is snow. For two years in a row, we had tremendous amounts of snow. It is a product of the Pacific Ocean. The Atlantic may have the same but on a smaller scale and it would impact areas of Europe, not the U.S.

 

[Yvonne Smith]

This seems really similar to what happened in North Carolina and Tennessee after Hurricane Helene went north and then stalled over those two states, dumping massive amounts of rain and flooding all of the rivers, and even breaking some of the dams.
When I was reading what the weather service said about the Washington floods, it is basically the same thing. A massive surge of rain soaked clouds, directed to one area, then stalled over that area, producing the massive flooding.

They have called for whole towns to be evacuated, and more rain and flooding is expected today and tomorrow as another front moves in from offshore.
They have had emergency workers out doing rescue already, and are bringing in more of the National Guard today, as well.
They have floods a lot in western Washington, but they are saying that this one will reach flood plains that are not usually flooded and will be the worst floods in years, maybe ever.