Category: 2025/2026

Are we done with the rain?

On By bryanweatherIn 2025/2026, Archives, Extra!!, Salem Area Forecast, The Mountains and Beyond, WEATHER ALERTSLeave a comment

Forecast

Let’s get straight to the forecast first, and I’m happy to say that we are not done with the rain for summer yet. Details below!

Forecast details

1.) Sunday (Father’s Day) looks great in my opinion. A nice cool morning with a few clouds likely. Nearly wall to wall sunshine for the afternoon though. High of 85°.

2.) Monday – Wednesday are going to feel rather hot with widespread highs in the 90s. Thursday will be much cooler.

3.) Thursday night into Friday morning is when I expect rain to arrive. This should be a nice steady rain hitting the entire Willamette Valley and most of western Oregon for that matter. Rain changes to scattered showers in the afternoon.

4.) Saturday looks like a shower and sunbreak type of day with thundershowers possible.

5.) Probably a little too soon to be talking about next Sunday, but it’s possible that the showers persist into next Sunday as well. More details later this week.

I also expect to have additional details on rainfall amounts, timing etc. in a future post this coming week. For now, plan on a wetter Friday and Saturday, and at a minimum, cooler weather next Sunday.

Drought and wildfires

I see a lot of wild posts online, and trying to sort through truth versus fiction or speculation can be tough, but I suppose that’s why I’m here haha. In this section, I’ll discuss our current drought situation, and then why I’m not panicking about our wildfire season yet.

Drought update

It’s true that most of Oregon has been much drier than normal for several months now. Salem is currently running at about 50% of our typical June rainfall for this point in the month. We picked up only 29% of our average monthly precip for May, 99% of average in April, and 71% in March. We have to go back to February to find a wetter than average month around here.

The drought monitor map reveals that it’s more of an issue the farther south and east one goes in Oregon. For instance. Just 50 some miles to our south, Eugene only had 13% of their typical May rainfall (versus 29% in Salem), and that’s been the trend for much of this spring. On the flipside, places to our northwest like Astoria and Clatsop County are actually doing alright.

We came into spring with almost no snow in our mountains below 4500 feet across the state – a near historic low. The lack of snow exposed vegetation and underbrush in our forests earlier than we would typically see and vegetation is drying out. The virtually nonexistent snowpack is the other major reason why large sections of central and eastern Oregon are facing such serious drought conditions.

Fortunately there’s some hope. A few days of wetting rain next weekend won’t end the drought, but it can’t hurt. More importantly, the rain next weekend could really put our fire season on hold west of the Cascades, and that brings me to my final point.

No need to panic about wildfires yet

I want to remind you that fire season around here has much more to do with what occurs during June through September rather than the months prior, but in our world of clickbait, likes, subscribes, and follows, dramatic headlines often take center stage. Click on the images below to get a closer look.

And honestly, these are just a small sample of the posts I’ve seen. I’m not forecasting how bad the fire season is, but I want to set a few things straight. If you were to ask random people off the street, I’m certain most of them would believe that every wildfire season over the past decade has been worse than normal, but that’s actually not true. I think a lot of it has to do with perception and headlines like you see above. When’s the last time you read a headline telling you that we had fewer acres burned than normal? Those headlines are out there, but they simply don’t make the rounds like scary predictions do.

For example, do you recall seeing this image circulated a few years ago (2023)? Probably not…. Such reality checks are hard to come by in our media these days. There’s rarely any follow up on what actually took place. Only dire warnings of the future. These numbers below were provided by the Oregon Department of Forestry and the Northwest Interagency Coordination Center.

If you think about it, every single summer here is generally warm and very dry regardless of how much rain fell during the previous winter. Yes, the lack of snow in the mountains this year made things worse earlier than normal, but how bad fire season gets really depends on the conditions we see in summer. Well timed summer rains can go a long ways in preventing large fires. Consequently, poorly timed dry thunderstorms with lightning strikes and gusty dry winds can make the season terrible (think 2020).

Lastly, and very sadly, people have been an increasingly higher cause of fires than in the past which can really alter what could have been a quiet fire season. If you want to read more, here is an article from the end of last summer: 2025 fire season – less acreage, but more human causes

Hopefully we will never tire from seeking the truth. Okay, have a fantastic Father’s Day celebrating the fathers or fatherlike figures in our lives, and stay safe out there! 🙂

Bad news

On By bryanweatherIn 2025/2026, Extra!!, Salem Area Forecast, The Mountains and Beyond, WEATHER ALERTSLeave a comment

It’s been several days since I last posted. Work, school, and life keep me busy, plus, the weather is really not doing anything exciting. Sadly, things have trended drier and drier since my last forecast. I understand many people enjoy the sunny weather; however, we need rain and mountain snow, and if the dry weather continues to dominate our weather, then we could be looking at some severe drought conditions this summer. Yes, we still have all of February, March, & April, so I’m not too concerned yet, but the ski resorts are missing out on valuable income with each passing day, and could really use more snow asap.

The current snow water equivalent map looks like this. Basically, this is a map showing the percentage of water in the current snowpack compared to where we should be at this time of year.

Well below average across the entire state. The drought monitor on the other hand does not look nearly as bad right now, and that is largely due to the big rainstorms we saw back in December.

Forecast details

1.) Dry weather continues through at least next Tuesday or Wednesday.

2.) Nights remain very cold. Salem was 24 degrees this morning. Brrrr! Lows continue to dip well into the 20s. A reinforcing shot of cool, but very dry air moves south from Canada Friday. Unfortunately, it will be a dry airmass, so no mountain snow. Just more cold clear nights and sunny days.

3.) Next chance for rain doesn’t arrive until at least next Monday or Tuesday. Rain chances increase quite a bit after the middle of next week as indicated by this chart below:

You can see the dramatic increase in members showing rainfall around the 28th and 29th. Let’s hope those don’t dry out, and let’s hope they end up being cooler systems for some mountain snow.

One final thought.

Navigating truth and reality versus scary, clickbait, or agenda driven biased information can be tricky online. This is not a statement as to how much climate change is driven by the actions of humans versus natural cycles. It’s simply a statement to help inform and keep my wonderful viewers in touch with the reality side of news and information. This type of dry, snowless winter has happened before, and will happen again. I have some “modern” examples, but there are even records dating back to the early years of Europeans arriving in Oregon of very dry winters “randomly” occurring.

In more modern times, the winter of 1976/1977 stands as the driest on record for many western Oregon locations. Less than an inch of rain fell for the entire month of January that winter, and Salem recorded 68 completely dry days between November through January. Imagine being a ski resort operator that winter or a farmer relying on ground water or seasonal streams to water crops.

These very dry winters happen, and living through them sucks, especially for farmers and people in the snow recreation business, but they do happen. The winter of 2000/2001 was another extremely dry year as well, and Salem saw two snowless winters in the early 2000s (2002/2003 and 2004/2005).

Will we get a February snow event? Maybe, but it is also possible we finally see a completely snowless winter. Portland has been setting a record for most winters in a row with measurable snow for the past few years now. As of last winter, they are at 10 years in a row with measurable snowfall! The previous record was just 7 years.

So yes, things currently look bad, and there’s no guarantee they turn around this season, but such things have happened before, and as of right now, we are not in an unprecedented situation.

If you are wealthy, have lots of extra time on your hands, and love snow, then book a ticket to the North Carolina or Virginia. A massive snow and ice storm is expected over there this coming weekend. Many locations will pick up well over a foot of snow with just this one storm.

Stay safe, and enjoy the beautiful weather the best you can!

Drying out plus a look at next week

On By bryanweatherIn 2025/2026, Extra!!, Salem Area Forecast, The Mountains and Beyond, WEATHER ALERTSLeave a comment

It’s been a soaker the past couple of days! Some hefty rain totals as shown on this map.

You can see how effective the mountains are in this pattern at ringing out available moisture with 8 to 10 inches falling in parts of the Coast and Cascade ranges.

Focusing on the mid Willamette Valley, it appears as though the biggest flooding issues were a few closed streets, some flooded parking lots, and a lot of field flooding outside of town. No major/widespread flooding here. Both the Luckiamute and Pudding rivers are still rising, and will peak this afternoon/evening. Here’s a forecast for the Pudding River by the time it reaches Aurora.

Flooding has been more serious out along the coast, in the Coast Range, and up in western Washington where the flooding has been much more severe.

Forecast

If you want drier weather, then you are in luck. Counting today, we have two mostly dry days followed by two completely dry (albeit foggy) days. A four day stretch of mostly dry weather. Seems deserved doesn’t it?

Today and Thursday: Mostly cloudy and mostly dry. Slight chance for a few light showers, especially overnight into early Thursday morning. Very warm for this time of year as we continue to be on the warm side of the jet stream. Highs near 60 today and Thursday.

FRI & SAT: Dry, but fog is very likely along with afternoon clouds each day. Highs closer to 50°.

SUN: Periods of light rain. Still very warm with a high of 55°.

Next week

Next week looks really wet again. At the moment I see three more significant storms with showers during the in-between times. The first storm comes in on Monday, another one Wednesday, and a third arrives for Thursday & Friday. The third storm looks “juicy” with lots of moisture to work with, and since we have saturated soils, plus rivers running higher than normal, we could be looking at another flooding scenario. Too far out to know details, but keep this in mind.

Disaster preparedness

Hey, if you’re not already, use this week to make sure you have the essentials you need to survive if we have a major storm or disruption to our supply chains. For the vast majority of us, this rainstorm did not cause any serious issues, but that might not be the case next time, and why wait to rush to the store for basic essentials when a storm is on our doorstep?

Finally, I see some hope for our mountain snowpack and ski resorts. Wednesday’s storm might end up being a big mountain snow producer as we finally dip to the colder side of the jet stream. Not sure if the snow will last or not, but it’s a good sign as our mountains are way behind in snowpack for the moment.

I’ll have plenty more details on next week’s storms in a few days. For now, time to take it easy, and I leave you with these high water photos taken around the Salem area Tuesday.

Heavy rains, flooding next week

On By bryanweatherIn 2025/2026, Extra!!, Salem Area Forecast, The Mountains and Beyond, WEATHER ALERTSLeave a comment

It’s been a busy day for me looking over flood maps, rain charts, and different forecasts. Needless to say, we have some very heavy rain on the way, and not only heavy, but prolonged too with some flooding looking very likely now. Details below:

The quick version

Typical rainy weather continues now through Monday, and by this I mean periods of rain or scattered showers. Some brief periods of moderate to heavy rain, but no threat for flooding during this time frame. Between now and Monday afternoon I expect around 1 – 1.5 inches of rain in total.

Monday night through Wednesday: Steady rain during the majority of both these days with frequent periods of heavier rain. Winds will be pretty gusty at times throughout this period too. I’m thinking gusts 35 to 40mph. Not real strong, but if soils are saturated, and they will be, I could see a few isolated instances of trees coming down here in the valley and along with those trees, some power lines. Please be prepared for some power outages next week.

Extended forecast

We are approaching the event and close enough to share some estimated rainfall totals. I’m thinking Salem easily sees over 2 inches between Tuesday and Wednesday alone, and this could be a rare time where we see upwards of 4 inches within a couple of days. Depending on which side of these totals we end up on, we could see some real serious localized flooding on the small creeks around town.

Remember, in situations like this conditions can vary greatly depending on location. My forecasts are typically centered around Salem, but generally can be used and are valid for locations like: Monmouth, Independence, Albany, Silverton, Wilsonville, Canby, and any locations nearby or in between. This next graphic shows my thoughts for this region for Monday – Wednesday.

This next graphic covers flood risk for local rivers. There are many more creeks and rivers around our region than I had time for, but this should give you a good idea of what to expect.

If you live near any sort of creek, river, flood basin etc. that is not listed, then you should be paying attention to water levels and hopefully you can sort of estimate what might happen based on the information I’ve provided.

For the most part, expect smaller creeks to rise quickly during the midst of our rainstorm next week, but those same creeks should fall shortly after the heaviest rains end. The mid sized streams and rivers take longer to rise to flood stage which is why most of those may not flood until late Tuesday night or Wednesday.

I still do not expect the Willamette River to flood. It will of course rise a lot, and I could see River Road heading out towards Independence closing (maybe), but there is just no snowpack to melt, and the Cascade reservoirs have a ton of storage capacity right now. Our biggest floods historically have always happened when we have a large snowpack present in the Cascades, and (typically) when the reservoirs are already closer to capacity. Those two factors are really going to save us from what could have been much worse flooding this time.

The coast and Coast Range

Stormy! Not necessarily super strong winds or huge waves, but the combination of the heavy rain, gusty winds, and higher than normal waves for several days straight will make for wild times along our coastline. Rain totals of 5 to 8 inches are likely over the next five days, wind gusts of 40 to 50mph Monday afternoon through Wednesday night, and at least some flooding is likely on most of the coastal rivers.

Phew! There’s a lot going on next week, and winter is still young, so I’ve created a Discord server with several “channels” on it. On Discord you will find a channel where you can share questions, comments, or your current weather conditions. There is a “photos” channel designed for easily sharing weather related photos. I’ve also added a couple of channels for linking these “Bryan Weather Alert” forecasts, and lastly, I added a channel which will be great for sharing quick, but important updates to the forecast! It should be a lot of fun, an easy place to finally share weather related photos together, and a great way to engage as a community a little.

Please feel free to join the Bryan Weather Alert community on this newly created Discord server! Bryan Weather Alerts on Discord

Take care, and stay safe out there! I’m certain I’ll have more updates in the next few days.

Much wetter pattern on the way

On By bryanweatherIn 2025/2026, Extra!!, Salem Area Forecast, The Mountains and Beyond, WEATHER ALERTSLeave a comment

We are several days into what has been a pretty dry stretch of weather, but there are clear signals this will be changing soon. At least some rain is expected every single day for at least the next eight days beginning Thursday (the 4th). Some days the rain will be light and spotty, and other days (especially next Tuesday and Wednesday) the rain will be heavier, steadier, and more widespread. Details below:

Details

The short version is that we have a very mild, but wet pattern coming up. No mountain snow whatsoever for ski resorts with this type of pattern. Maybe some snow briefly Thursday before temperatures warm up. Lots of highs in the 50s and lows struggling to dip into the 40s.

We have seen similar setups before. If the rain is spread out enough over a long enough period of time then we typically avoid any sort of flooding issues. If it falls heavy enough for a long enough period of time then we see flooding. Pretty straight forward.

What about flooding?

Right now my thoughts are tomorrow (Thursday) through Monday will be regular western Oregon rainy days. Nothing too wild. If you find yourself outdoors then you will need to plan accordingly. Tuesday through Thursday of next week hold the potential to be more impactful. Still too early to know how much rain will fall, but it’s becoming increasingly likely this time frame will feature heavier rainfall which could lead to some sort of flooding issues. Continue reading for more details. 🙂

Currently I don’t see a threat for major flooding for two reasons: the very low water levels in our reservoirs, plus the lack of any meaningful snowpack. If we do see flooding next week it’s more likely to occur along the coast and Coast Range. Any flooding in the valley would be at a more localized/smaller scale – think Pudding River, the Luckiamute River, and maybe some of the local creeks around town, and again, nothing major. I plan to have a fresh update Friday with more details.

November 2025

The month is all wrapped up and honestly, there’s very little to say about it. November 2025 was damp with the majority of days experiencing at least a little bit of rain, but with very few big rainstorms or heavy rain events. The result? A drier than normal November.

As far as temperatures are concerned, well it was a mild month. Salem had 19 days with above normal highs! These two graphs depict our temperature situation from the month very well. Our coldest highs occurred of foggy days that never really cleared out. Otherwise, no big cold spells this past month to speak of.

Take care and have a wonderful rest of your week!

October 2025

On By bryanweatherIn 2025/2026, Extra!!, Salem Area Forecast, The Mountains and Beyond, WEATHER ALERTSLeave a comment

Good evening! We cover a lot in this post. Here’s a super short “table of contents” for you:

  1. October 2025 temperature and precipitation stats.
  2. Highlights from October.
  3. Our extended forecast.

October 2025

October 2025 brought to an end a string of 6 months with warmer than average temperatures. We ended pretty darn close to average, but officially 1.1 degrees below normal. This image shows how high temperatures panned out for the month.

A lot of slightly cooler than average days, but nothing super wild. This next graph shows the same data, but does a good job of showing just how close to normal many of those cool days were.

That graph does an excellent job at showing just how dramatically our temperatures drop in October. I like it!

Zooming out to see the big picture, we can see how this October was really warm across much of the country with the west coast and a small corner of the southeast being the exceptions.

This next image shows precipitation per day for Salem for the month of October. In the bottom right corner you will find the total for the month and percentage of normal. Remember you can always click on images for a larger view.

Highlights from the month

October 2025 goes down as a mostly uneventful month. Our coldest low occurred on the 30th with a temperature of 34°. The most interesting weather events took place on the 25th when we saw widespread wind gusts above 40mph (45 in Salem), lightning & thunder, and heavy rain showers. The coastline experienced high surf as well. Nearly a foot of snow fell at the ski resorts the following day.

Our forecast

Mon: Showers in the morning turning into a steady rain during the afternoon. A chilly high of only 53° with around a half an inch or rain. A great day for warm layers and a rain jacket!

Tue: Lots of mid/high level clouds with a few peaks of sunshine. Mainly dry. High of 57°.

Wed – Fri: Frequent periods of rain and breezy too. Wind gusts 30 – 40mph Wednesday and again late Thursday afternoon and evening. Over an inch of rain spread over the course of these three days. Potential for some heavier downpours and maybe another thunderstorm or two Wednesday afternoon.

Sat & Sun: We might finally have a dry weekend (both days)! I mean today was great, but the very first weekend in October is the last time we have seen a totally dry Saturday/Sunday combo. Highs in the upper 50s. Rain appears to make a return next Monday or Tuesday.

Have great first week of November!!

The next nine days

On By bryanweatherIn 2025/2026, Extra!!, Salem Area Forecast, The Mountains and Beyond, WEATHER ALERTSLeave a comment

Can you believe it’s almost Friday and the end of October? Time to look ahead at the forecast for this weekend (many of you want to know), plus the forecast for next week, and at the very end I have a fun little weather history tidbit for you.

I’ve combed through the weather models searching and searching and I cannot find a single completely dry 24 hour period after Friday through at least the next ten days! Eventually we’ll see dry weather again, it always comes back, but it’s very clear we are entering full on rainy season mode here in western Oregon. We have a lot of rainy, grey, and damp November weather on tap with only very short respites here and there.

Extended forecast

Highlights

Friday: The first half of the evening looks dry . Late evening activities could get rained on. Rain will begin earlier in the evening the further northwest you go. So the Portland metro could see a rainier Halloween evening than Salem. Locations south and east of Salem could easily stay dry well through midnight. If you’re wondering why apps keep on changing their forecasts for this Friday it’s because it just doesn’t get much closer than this. The estimated radar image for 8pm Friday night shows a band of rain just to our northwest. Move that sucker 25 miles closer and we have a very wet evening. See how tricky that is?

Saturday: Wet with rain much of the day.

Sunday: This is it! It could be mostly dry during the daylight hours Sunday, so take advantage of it! 🙂

Mon – Tue: Wet at times, but nothing real wild.

Wednesday: This storm looks a little more impactful with heavier rain likely, and possibly some gusty winds.

Thursday & Friday: It seems like another pretty wet storm system will move in at some point during these two days bringing steady rain and possibly more gusty winds.

Impacts

None of the storms this coming week appear capable of producing really strong winds. Instead plan on typical run of the mill 30 to 40mph gusts. Should this change, then I would of course do my very best to inform you. Right now the biggest issue weather will have on your day to day life (other than getting soaking wet outside) is the likelihood of clogged/backed up drains creating ponding on roadways and in some parking lots. As far as mountain snow goes, well I don’t see very much at all over the next 8 days. These storms will be on the mild side. This means wet and rainy Cascade passes.

Some fun weather facts for you all. I looked back into the history and record books, and I found out that in 1935 it snowed 5 inches officially at the Salem Airport on Halloween making it the earliest snowfall in Salem on record.

As far as the single snowiest day in Salem’s recorded history goes, it appears the record was set in 1937 when 25 inches fell between January 31st and February 1st. There are several documents (journals, weather reports etc.) indicating that up to 33+ inches fell in parts of south Salem in just those two days alone! Check out this photo from downtown Salem after the storm. Keep in mind this all happened after 6 to 12 inches of snow had already fallen during the week prior.

And this next photo was taken on State Street in downtown Salem after the storm.

What would happen if that took place today?!?!? I suppose every winter brings with it new opportunities for something wild to happen, and since Friday marks the earliest snowfall on record here, I figured it’s time to start keeping an eye out for snow…. Or, we could end up with a snowless winter which happens far more often than big snowstorms around here. :/ Time will tell…

Okay, stay safe out there, remind your kids to be respectful and mindful of people, property, and cars when running around from house to house in search of candy (sounds a little weird when you think about it lol), and of course, have fun! 🙂