Heavy Rains Bring Flood Watches for Oregon / Washington Cascades - Portland, Coast Very Wet

Published 8/16/24 at 4:17 a.m.
By Andre' GW Hagestedt, Oregon Coast Beach Connection

(Portland, Oregon) – A run of flash flood watches, thunderstorms and heavy rains are about to roll into much of Oregon and Washington, as the National Weather Service (NWS) said Saturday is going to be filled with varying degrees of August storms throughout the Pacific Northwest.

A serious downpour is in store for just about everywhere, including the Portland / Vancouver metro area, the entire Oregon coast and Washington coast, the Cascades of Washington and Oregon, and all the way down through the southern parts of the state. Towns like Eugene, Bend, Woodburn, Pendleton, Salem, Roseburg and Medford are all looking at one kind of a deluge or another. Something like a quarter to half an inch in one day is possible for places like the Willamette Valley, Cannon Beach, Coos Bay, Cottage Grove, Sisters, Corvallis and up into Westport or Longview on Saturday. Rainfall amounts are predicted to be much heavier in the Cascades, however.

Thunderstorms are a bigger issue for many of the sections already in the burn zone, but the torrential rains may at least help douse some current flames. 60 mph winds in the Cascades aren't expected to help those areas, however.

“The short term forecast is highlighted by increasing chances for a widespread soaking rain across all of western WA/OR (50-80% chance) as widespread showers and scattered thunderstorms bring a threat of heavy rain and isolated wind damage,” the NWS said. “These showers and storms are associated with an upper level low that models and their ensembles show lingering over the coastal waters off the south Oregon coast. This will result in southeasterly flow aloft across southwest WA and northwest OR, helping to advect moisture into the area and increase instability.”

Keep up on all Oregon weather alerts at the Oregon Coast Weather page, which also has ocean forecasts as well as beach towns. These include fire watches, storms or flood issues from all over the state, not just the coast. Jump to the All Oregon Alerts section and refresh your browser when you come back.

The Cascades will be getting the heaviest doses, and those mountain areas from the middle part of the state up through northern Washington are under flood watches for most of Saturday.

“The threat for thunderstorms is currently highest in the Cascades where instability will be maximized according to the latest model guidance,” the NWS said.

Burn areas from this year are of concern for floods, but where the storms actually happen is a tricky thing and may change the alerts during the day. The NWS said if you're in those areas you should have a way to check for flood warnings.

“As such, a Flash Flood Watch has been issued for the south WA Cascades and Oregon Cascades from Lane County northward to cover this threat as this will pose a safety concern for crews working on these fires,” the NWS said. “While confidence is high somewhere in the Cascades will be hit hard from thunderstorms, confidence is low in regards to the exact location and exact timing. Nevertheless, confidence has reached the 50% threshold needed to issue a Watch, and zones may be added or removed from the Watch as confidence increases.”

See Washington Coast Weather - Oregon Coast Weather

The Portland area and I-5 corridor are also looking at some possibility of thunderstorms, but not nearly as severe as in the Cascades and spots such as Government Camp down through Stayton, Linn County or Detroit Lake.

For much of Oregon and Washington – including the coastlines - things dry up on Sunday but most of the week stays fairly cloudy yet reasonably warm. The coast even hits the 70s later.

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Andre' GW Hagestedt is editor, owner and primary photographer / videographer of Oregon Coast Beach Connection, an online publication that sees over 1 million pageviews per month. He is also author of several books about the coast.

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