But why don't we ever get any hurricanes in Washington? It's all about ocean temperature. Hurricanes need warm water -- over 75 degrees -- to form and survive. At our latitude, the Pacific Ocean is way too cold (between 50-60 degrees) to form or sustain them. So any hurricane that even tried to come this way would fizzle long before it reached here. However, we have had winter windstorms that have featured hurricane-force winds (over 74 mph) but it's not considered a hurricane if it is not a tropical-based storm.