GORDON’S UPDATE: Weather 9/28/23; Full Harvest Moon 9/29/23, Fair, Dry & Mild Weekend

By Gordon McCraw, Meteorologist for the Tillamook County Pioneer

Now we are under the influence of an upper level trough pattern and this gave us a threat of scattered showers today as disturbances ride the flow across. There were some minor disturbances that rode the flow and enhanced the shower threat from time to time today. The trough will be sliding eastward tonight so the activity will become more scattered, the winds diminish, the low near 48.

The trough continues to the east tomorrow, and we see mostly cloudy skies with only widely scattered showers, winds becoming northerly 5-10, the high near 64. High pressure starts building tomorrow night, the winds becoming northerly 8-12 gusting to 20, the low near 44.

We will enjoy high pressure over the weekend that will give us fair, dry, and mild conditions so we expect sunny skies with northerly winds, the highs near 67, then mostly clear skies tonight, the lows around 46.

The models show the ridge flattening next week and the flow becomes more zonal which provides a road for disturbances to ride into the area on, so we expect mostly cloudy skies for the start of next week with a chance of showers Monday, and Tuesday, and Wednesday, the highs near 64, and lows near 51. The long range models also suggest a ridge moves in and we see a dryer offshore flow the second half of next week.

Tomorrow is the Day – Harvest Moon

Don’t forget, tomorrow September 29th we see, what is known as the “Harvest Moon.” Just to remind you, it is called the Harvest Moon because farmers used the light from the full moon to work into the night to finish bringing in their crops.

This full moon event just happens to be a, “Super Moon.” This is when the moon appears larger and brighter than normal. Why, well because the moon is actually at its closest point in its orbit around the earth, only 224,854 miles as the crow flies. This makes the moon appear about 5% bigger and 13% brighter than average.

So, the times for this event are as follows: