Snow makes encore appearance across parts of region

SEATTLE -- Monday's storm brought areas of strong wind. Tuesday's storm brought pockets of lowland snow.

What say for Wednesday's storm, we just combine the two?

A third storm in as many days rolled into Western Washington early Wednesday morning, bringing just a familiar chilly rain for most, but for some, it also brought some wet snow, or strong winds, or both. It was enough that a handful of school districts delayed the start of classes.

Much of what snow was falling around the greater Puget Sound was just for show and didn't stick beyond a brief dusting as temperatures were in the mid 30s and gradually climbed to near 40. However, there were a few spots that did a better job of collecting some snow than others -- particularly the far north Seattle and south Snohomish County areas (South Everett, Lynnwood, Mukilteo), King County foothills, Hood Canal and Kitsap Peninsula areas, southwestern Washington and parts of the coast.

Snow totals were generally less than an inch around the Puget Sound region, but snow totals were much greater west of Puget Sound, plus they were also dealing with strong winds of 40-50 mph.

Trooper Russ Winger said they have received several reports of trees down across Mason, Jefferson and Kitsap Counties, including along US-101 and SR-104. Overall, troopers have responded to 119 calls for assistance and counting in that region.

A Jefferson County snow plow driver was trapped for a while on Coyle Road after power lines came crashing down on the truck. The driver remained safely inside until Puget Sound Energy could disarm the wires and remove them from the truck. He wasn't hurt.

Puget Sound Energy reported about 3,000 customers had lost power on Wednesday -- 1,800 around Poulsbo due to snow and 1,100 or so in the South Sound due to wind.

Near Mukilteo, a Washington State Patrol car was rear-ended by a car Wednesday morning on Highway 525 along the SR-99 overpass. Trooper Mark Francis says the trooper had pulled over to help at a one-car accident when his car was hit by a pickup truck that lost control on a slushy roadway. No one was injured.



Meanwhile, the main city of Seattle had just a wet snow or mix and roads were bare and wet. And by midday, temperatures finally began to warm in the stubbornly snowy spots to turn to rain as well.

The wet snow was a byproduct of some lingering cold air from Tuesday's storm combined with the storm arriving around the time of morning low temperatures. The storm itself is just a typical rain storm and its associated winds will gradually scour out the cold air and change whatever snow is falling to rain before the snow has any chance to do much accumulating.

But while the snow is pretty to look at, it's the storm's winds that have potential to cause problems. High Wind Warnings are in effect through 4 p.m. on the coast and 7 p.m. in the Northwest Interior for gusts as high as 60 mph. Already Wednesday, Friday Harbor has reported a gust to 52 mph while the Whidbey Island NAS had a gust of 48 mph and Everett hit 32 mph.

It'll be a blustery day in the Puget Sound region too with gusts of 30-35 mph likely, but the storm's track is not conducive to strong winds in this area.

Up in the mountains, it's another day, another snow forecast measured in feet. A Winter Storm Warning is in effect all the way until 4 a.m. Thursday for another 1-2 feet of snow, although the passes will be on the lower end of that forecast.

Once this storm passes, we all get a breather with just cool and showery weather expected Thursday through the weekend.

Long range models suggest it won't be a White Christmas, but rather partly sunny after some fog.

The Associated Press contributed to this report

Snow totals as of Wednesday morning:

Seabeck: 4"
Poulsbo: 2.2"
Port Orchard: 1.8"
Bremerton: 1.0"
Concrete: 1.0"
North Bend: 0.5"
Everett: 0.5"
Mukilteo: 0.5"
Gig Harbor: 0.4"
Port Townsend: 0.4"
Olympia: Trace
Bellevue: Trace
Shoreline: Trace