If you’re thinking the extra sun Western Washington soaked in this winter is out of the ordinary, you aren’t wrong. The SeaTac weather station recorded a 14-day-long streak of no precipitation in January 2026, just one day below the longest January dry streak on record in 1963.

It’s also been warmer than average, with temperatures around 2 to 5 degrees Fahrenheit above normal across nearly all areas of the state, according to the Washington State Climate Office. With December’s floods in mind, this dry spell may seem like a perfect relief from unwelcome weather. But experts say the warm weather and less-than-average precipitation is a warning for winters to come. Where is the snow?

The warm and dry winter weather has brought a concerning deficit for Washington’s snowpack, a.k.a. the snow that accumulates at high elevations from different storms and doesn’t melt until the spring. Statewide snowpack is lower than 95% of all years in the historical record, according to the Washington State Climate Office.

Washington, along with Oregon, Colorado, Utah, Arizona and New Mexico, is in a snow drought. These occur when snowpack is abnormally low for the time of year and can result from warm temperatures or lack of precipitation, according to NOAA.

Though it hasn’t been extraordinarily dry, take December’s relentless, atmospheric-river-fueled precipitation for example. The rain has mostly been too warm to build up as snow. In order for every basin in Washington, except the upper Columbia, to meet the normal amount of snowpack by April 1, Washington would need more snow than what’s been recorded in 90% of our historical record, said Karin Bumbaco, Deputy State Climatologist at the Washington State Climate Office.

So, what does a snow drought spell for the South Sound? Well for one, our drinking water systems have contributions from winter precipitation and spring snow melt, Bumbaco said. “Those reservoirs will be fed less from the snow melt in the spring because there’s much less snow,” she said. “It could also mean that by the end of summer, there could be some water supply issues in terms of voluntary conservation, or even mandatory if it gets really bad.”

In 2015 when the snowpack was even lower than it is today, the snow drought contributed to high wildfire intensity and losses of important agricultural crops, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture. Even ski areas had to close earlier in the season.

As for snow in the lowlands, there is a slight possibility the South Sound region will experience some. But according to National Weather Service Meteorologist Jeff Michalski, the probability is low.

“The air mass will be cool enough where a mix of rain and snow could occur, but it’s not looking like any significant accumulation is expected,” Michalski said. “Even the probability of getting one inch of snow over the lowlands, including the whole Seattle, Tacoma metro areas, is really less than 10%.”

December showers

It’s hard to forget December’s catastrophic flooding in Western Washington, a historic amount of destruction forcing mass evacuations catalyzed by an atmospheric river. An atmospheric river, also known as a “pineapple express,” is a long, narrow region in the atmosphere that carries water vapor outside the tropics, according to NOAA.

These weather events are not unusual and many atmospheric rivers are weak systems that don’t trigger flooding, Bumbaco said.

“There was a study done in 2014 that found that in Western Washington, 40 to 50% of our November through April precipitation is because of atmospheric rivers,” she said. “So we see them every winter. They vary in duration and intensity.”

What made December’s atmospheric river unusual was its long duration and the sheer amount of rain cast upon the Pacific Northwest. The system poured up to 10 inches of rain on some areas and an estimated 5 trillion gallons of water over one week, according to NASA.

Yet, atmospheric rivers can have beneficial effects. December’s system was able to fill reservoirs to higher than what they would normally be at that time of year, Bumbaco said.

Dense fog

The dry spells the South Sound has been experiencing also brings another side effect to the region — dense fog. As we’ve shifted into a drier-than-normal period in January, more foggy mornings have come along with it.

“Temperatures are actually warmer as you go up in the atmosphere, rather than colder as you move up in the atmosphere,” Bumbaco said. “So often some of our higher elevations like Mount Rainier would be sunny, but then the lower elevations around Puget Sound would be socked in with fog.”

Winter fog in the Pacific Northwest is usually radiation fog, which is caused by clear weather allowing the ground to cool and chill the air in contact with it.

“Especially if the low level air mass is very stagnant, if there’s light winds, and poor mixing, then at areas near the Sound, we’ll see some fog or low Stratus forming in the mornings as the air mass cools at night,” Michalski said.

Despite the name, radiation fog has nothing to do radioactivity. Its danger lies in its low visibility, which creates dangerous driving conditions that put people at risk for crashing.

So, are the weather systems we’re encountering this winter caused by climate change? We’re a little too early in the game to say so, Bumbaco said.

“We’re stuck in this pattern that’s bringing warmer than normal temperatures for Washington, the Pacific Northwest and the whole western U.S. as a whole,” she said. “But this particular pattern, it’s hard to tie back to climate change. This high-pressure pattern is the same one that’s causing the East Coast to become much colder than normal over the last few weeks.”