SEATTLE: A strong storm was engulfing Washington state on Wednesday, causing hundreds of thousands of people to lose power, disrupting traffic, and resulting in at least one fatality and two injuries.
Officials from the local fire department said on social media that a woman was killed Tuesday after a tree fell on a homeless camp in Lynnwood, which is just north of Seattle. In Maple Valley, southeast of Seattle, a tree toppled on a trailer, injuring two more people.
Western Washington schools either canceled or delayed Wednesday’s start of classes.
Overnight, trees and electrical lines were downed by the storm, which had hurricane force winds of 50 mph and gusts of up to 70 mph. According to Poweroutage.us, it caused more than 600,000 homes and businesses in Northern California, Southwest Oregon, and Washington to lose power.
Rich Otto, a meteorologist at the NWS Weather Prediction Centre in College Park, Maryland, stated that the storm was only getting started. “Over Southwest Oregon and Northern California, we have only received two to three inches of rain so far,” Otto stated.
But in the coming days, the storm—known as a “bomb cyclone,” which occurs when the storm increases quickly—will stall over Northern California, he said. “On Thursday, there is the largest spike. By Friday, we’re expecting 10 to 15 inches of rain, with some areas seeing up to 20 inches,” Otto stated, with northern California and southwest Oregon being the primary areas of worry.
When a frigid polar air mass collides with warm tropical air, a process known to meteorologists as “bombogenesis,” a bomb cyclone quickly strengthens in 24 hours or less.
In the Pacific Northwest, the weather service has issued numerous warnings and watches, including blizzard warnings from Northern Washington to the Sierra Nevada Range, flood watches and warnings, and high wind alerts.
The storm was making vehicle travel dangerous, according to the state’s transportation department. Traffic throughout the state was being slowed by weather and fallen trees, and the government advised drivers to use caution when driving.
