Category Archives: Weather

Weather

Bring in that garbage… for now

If you put your garbage out today, you can bring it back in. The city sent us this statement:

“Residential garbage, recycling, food and yard waste collection has been delayed in Seattle today, Wednesday, Dec. 24, due to dangerous road conditions. Wednesday residential customers will be collected next Wednesday Dec. 31.

“The city’s collections contractors have been running limited commercial routes around the clock this week, providing service urgent commercial accounts where containers are accessible. Service priorities include hospitals, health facilities, grocers and other accounts with severe capacity constraints…

“…Residential collections were suspended Thursday Dec. 18, through today, Wednesday Dec. 24, due to snow fall and road conditions. Limited commercial routes have been run Monday through Wednesday this week reaching approximately 30 percent of the businesses accounts in the city. Contractors are continually inspecting all neighborhoods throughout the day for service opportunities.

“Due to the Christmas holiday on Dec. 25, Thursday and Friday customers will be delayed one day. Thursday customers will be collected Friday, Dec. 26, and Friday customers will be collected Saturday, Dec. 27.

“Customers whose collections have been delayed by a week can set out double their normal amount of garbage at no additional charge. When setting out extra waste, customers are encouraged to place perishable food items in their collection containers and set bagged non-perishable items next to the containers. Customers who have had their collections missed two weeks in a row can also take their waste to Seattle’s Recycling and Disposal Stations, where it will be accepted at no charge.”

Weather

Things to know amid the ice and snow

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Icicles on Beacon Avenue. Photo by Wendi.
Icicles on Beacon Avenue. Photo by Wendi.
It’s looking like an ugly commute and a good day to call in “snowsick.”

If you do need to get out and about, Metro’s Ice and Snow service status page may help.

Other information that might be useful today:

  • The branch libraries are open only 1:00 – 5:00 pm today because of the weather. (The Central Library opens an hour earlier, at noon.)
  • Some King County services have closures or reduced hours.
  • Seattle Parks and Recreation’s School Age Care Winter Break Camps at all community centers are closed today. Regularly scheduled programming at Seattle Parks and Recreation facilities has been cancelled, but the facilities will be open.
  • The University of Washington, Seattle’s community colleges, and just about every other college in town are closed. Most of the K-12 kids are already on winter break.
  • Monday garbage pickup is delayed one day. Put it out on Tuesday (unless they delay it again!).
Weather

Brrrrrr!

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Very cold flamingos. Photo by Bridget C. from the Beacon Hill Blog photo pool on Flickr.
Very cold flamingos. Photo by Bridget C. from the Beacon Hill Blog photo pool on Flickr.
So far the snowstorm has dumped a bunch of snow on us, but not a horrible amount of wind on North Beacon Hill. Cross your fingers that it doesn’t get worse. With all the snow we’ve gotten, though — and it’s been falling steadily since yesterday afternoon — getting off the hill today is likely to be extremely difficult.

Please let us know what it’s like in your part of the Hill — traffic getting around OK? Particular places to avoid? Storm damage?

A little while ago I saw some folks skiing up Beacon Avenue. There’s always that method of getting around.

We’re not sure how much snow we’ve got this time — I just measured 7″, but I’m not sure how clear the spot I measured was before this storm, or if blowing snow has affected it. I would say we probably got at least 4″, though. That may be a conservative estimate.

We hope you are all keeping warm and being safe tonight!

Weather

Storm warning in effect

The National Weather Service has a Winter Storm Warning in effect for us from 4:00 pm Saturday to 4:00 pm Sunday. Here are some relevant excerpts (punctuation and lower-case added to make it more readable):

“A strong frontal system will spread precipitation inland over western Washington starting Saturday afternoon and continuing through much of Sunday. A combination of blizzard conditions, heavy snow, strong winds and ice buildups are expected…

“A major winter storm is on tap this weekend. Heavy snow is expected to develop along the coast on Saturday afternoon and then spread into the interior of western Washington early Saturday evening…

“Along the I-5 corridor north of Tacoma, including Seattle and Everett, storm-total snowfall of 4 to 8 inches is expected. In general, lighter amounts will occur near the Cascade foothills with heavier amounts further west along the shores of Puget Sound.”

The winds further east in the foothills are supposed to be extreme, and our winds, though less strong, will not be fun either. Be prepared.

Getting Around, Weather

Snow day Thursday updates

Please drive carefully if you must drive today!
Please drive carefully if you must drive today!

As of 10:20ish this morning:

  • Trash pickup for Thursday and Friday postponed
  • Golf courses closed for golf, but open for sledding!
  • Columbian Way exit of I-5/east end of West Seattle Bridge is closed now open after accidents have been cleared (updated 12:30pm)
  • Police are only responding to injury crashes — file property damage reports or hit-and-runs via internet

As of 11:20ish:

  • Beacon Avenue South appears to have been sanded, but only the southbound lane.
  • The Beacon Hill Library branch has a sign posted that they’re opening at noon today
  • Bank of America at the north end of Beacon Ave. is not yet open and no indication of when they might open
  • Metro‘s adverse weather route information
  • SDOT‘s snow routes map (pdf) — SDOT crews working 12-hour shifts until the weather improves

Between about 12:20 and 1:20:

  • Beacon Pub and Victrola/Galaxie open — Victrola is packed with toddlers!
  • Positive sighting of a northbound route 36 bus — also observed a “SPECIAL SHUTTLE” northbound on Beacon Ave., too (anyone know what that is?)
  • Sanding truck seen re-sanding southbound, northbound may have been sanded a while ago

2:00ish:

  • Road blocked eastbound by semi-truck impact with pole 32nd  & Myrtle
  • Honda struck utility pole at Beacon & Stevens
  • Animal control is only responding to life-threatening issues currently

Metro has cancelled or severely reduced service this afternoon and evening.

If you have additional news and updates on, please add them in the comments.

Thanks to West Seattle Blog’s Twitter reports for much of the first batch!

Weather

Did you hear that?

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Just before 5:40 am today we had two of the loudest possible thunderclaps imaginable. I was actually looking through my camera viewfinder, to take a picture of the falling snow, when there was a flash, then only a split-second later, a bomb-like boom that shook the house back and forth and caused car alarms to go off on our street. Then a couple of minutes later, it happened again. Did you hear them? Did they wake you up? Tell us about it in the comments to this post.