By Mary O’KEEFE

Taking A Look Outside Our Window

So far the monthly rain total recorded on the gauge at Rosemont Middle School is 1.44 inches; 1.29 of those inches occurred during Sunday’s storm. The mountain areas received anywhere from four to seven inches of rain. This California storm did not stop at our border, either, but continued to cause cold weather and even brought snow across many states.

“The storm [was] coming from the north [as did] the cold air mass,” said Robbie Munroe, meteorologist at NOAA.

The storm continued across Arizona bringing snow to the “town too tough to die” – Tombstone – then moved on through the central  United States. Then a different storm, as of Wednesday, picked up and was threatening the northeast area of the country.

So as Californians were looking for heavy winter coats and umbrellas, most of the rest of the country was bracing for its winter storm that would bring dangerous ice, winds and snow. 

The National Weather Service (NWS) issued winter storm warnings, winter storm watches and winter weather advisories for a broad area including the upper Midwest, northern Great Lakes and parts of the Northeast and mid-Atlantic. Ice storm warnings are also posted in northwest Virginia, northeast West Virginia, western Maryland and a small part of west-central Pennsylvania. These areas could see damaging ice accumulations, according to NWS on Wednesday, late afternoon.

My point of looking at the weather across the nation is to bring a little perspective to our local very chilly nights and mornings, rain and cloudy skies. Imagine what it is like to see snow on the ground in Tombstone? The town does get maybe one to three inches of snow a year but usually, according to a nearby resident (my brother), the snow falls, lands and melts. This week, on Tuesday, it stayed – at least for a while. Not having a system in place for “snow days” schools didn’t cancel but they did start a couple of hours later as buses navigated the snow. And I can tell you firsthand – cowboy boots are not the easiest to walk in across a snowy street.

So as we continue to look for the sun and warm temperatures in the area, it is important to remember the grass on the other side is covered with snow and ice. We should be grateful that the latest storm brought about three to four feet of snow to the Sierra Nevada which may not reverse our drought  but did bring a welcome water supply to California.

For the local area it looks like dry cold temperatures with clouds here and there. From today through next Thursday temperature highs will be in the low to high 60s, with lows in the 40s. Next weekend we can expect to finally see a little warmer temperatures with highs in the low 70s, and lows in the low 50s.

  Mary Okeefe