As storms go, it coulda been worse

The storm that was expected to slam the Harbor blew in and blew out without much local impact aside from power outages.

“It didn’t hit us with as much power as we expected, so we got lucky again,” said Charles Wallace, Grays Harbor County Emergency Management deputy director.

On Thursday, the National Weather Service weather station at Bowerman Airport in Hoquiam tracked the storm as it pushed into the area after 6 p.m. Two gusts of 56 mph were recorded, the first at 6:51 p.m. accompanied by sustained winds of 39 mph, and the second at 8:25 p.m. with sustained winds at 44 mph.

“The storm moved in in the evening hours, which is what we were expecting,” National Weather Service in Seattle Meteorologist Jeff Michalski said. “The winds peaked between 8 p.m. and 9 p.m. and they tapered off by midnight.”

By midnight, sustained winds were south/southwest at about 16 mph.

Hoquiam was the hardest hit on the Harbor. Ocean Shores saw a gust at 44 mph, and Ocean City had one at 42 mph. Aberdeen had a gust topping out at 38 mph at 7:47 p.m. accompanied by sustained winds of about 20 mph, according to unofficial spotter reports.

The National Weather Service weather station at Naselle, near the south end of Willapa Bay in Pacific County, saw a gust topping out at 77 mph, with sustained winds of 56 mph.

“They’re sitting high up at an elevation of 2,009 feet, so they’re going to have higher gusts than on the coast,” Michalski said.

Despite the gusts, nothing significant occured from the storm in Pacfic County, said Scott McDougall, deputy director of Pacific County Emergency Management.

“From an Emergency Management perspective, it was just a stormy night,” he said.

On Thursday, some schools and businesses throughout the region had let out early in anticipation of the storm. Two other storms had brought significant rainfall to the area earlier in the week (the Bowerman weather station has recorded more than 4 and a half inches of rain since Monday), and with the highly saturated ground the National Weather Service expected high winds with the third storm could easily topple trees, blocking roads and downing powerlines. While the winds were significant, the storm didn’t prove to be anything special, Michalski said.

“We can get these storms, especially at this time of year,” he said. “What looked different about this one is it affected a larger area — even Tacoma had higher winds.”

Tacoma had a gust of 58 mph. Near Marietta in Western Whatcom County on the Puget Sound north of Seattle, a gust of 71 mph was recorded, and a gust of 70 mph was recorded near Port Townsend.

“Most areas experienced the winds,” Michalski said. “We had spotty reports all throughout the interior and power outages up north.”

While this week’s trio of storms didn’t cause widespread damage, it’s only a matter of time before Mother Nature puts the Harbor at a standstill, Wallace said.

“It’s been five years since we’ve had anything bad here, but it’s going to happen again,” he said.

The Skokomish River in Mason County is the only river on the Olympic Peninsula remaining above flood stage. All flood watches in Grays Harbor County have expired.

The Weather Service is warning of a continued risk of landslides through Friday.

Power outages

While there was no reported property damage, roughly 2,500 customers lost power in Grays Harbor County due to a dozen significant outages, said Grays Harbor PUD Communications Director Ian Cope.

The outage calls began coming in around 5:30 p.m. from Grayland and Westport before spreading to Cedarville, McCleary, Elma, Pacific Beach, Moclips and Hoquiam.

“It was pretty widespread throughout east Grays Harbor County,” Cope said.

Power was restored around 10 p.m. when wind gusts began to die down.

Two Aberdeen crews and one from Elma were out during the outages. The largest single outage occurred around 7 p.m. in Cedarville, cutting power to more than 600 customers. The PUD restored power in Cedarville at around 8:30 p.m.

A wire went down on Highway 12 between the Lake Aberdeen turnoff and Baila Dip at about 7:30 p.m. The Washington State Patrol and the PUD responded to the scene and got the wire back up with no problems, Cope said.

On Friday, two volunteer crews were sent to Snohomish County to assist with outages. Aside from crews working on a meter and a transformer in Moclips that had sustained damages Thursday night, Grays Harbor County is back up and running.