It huffed. It puffed. But when all was done, it mostly bluffed.
While satellite images of the storm that crossed the Washington coast Thursday looked horrific, they revealed a comforting detail: a stiletto slice of relatively calm conditions that followed the Strait of Juan de Fuca from around Clallam Bay to Admiralty Inlet.
Weather watchers call it the “rain shadow.”
By Saturday, the National Weather Service had canceled a flood watch for the North Olympic Peninsula.
Double-digit winds had dwindled to 8 mph at Ellis Mountain, 2 mph at Indian Valley and 5 mph in Port Townsend.
They had gusted Thursday to 47 mph north off Cape Flattery, 30 mph near LaPush, 39 mph at Hurricane Ridge and 43 mph in Port Townsend.
By Saturday, power had been restored after scattered electrical outages across the Peninsula.
Olympic National Park remained closed Saturday at Hurricane Ridge, Elwha, Sol Duc, Queets, Hoh, Mora and Quinault. Rangers shut the roads to avoid visitors being injured by the storm or trapped by falling trees.
Park Superintendent Sarah Creachbaum said Thursday the closures would continue until all danger had passed.
And residents also must wait to see the bright gift the clouds were expected to bestow on the Olympic Mountains: the foot or more of new snow the storm was expected to drop on Hurricane Ridge by this morning.
But that invitation also might prove to be better than the promised party.
In the Olympics
By tonight, the snow level was predicted to fall to 2,500 feet from Saturday’s forecast 4,000 feet.
It was expected to rise to 7,000 feet Monday night before dropping to 4,000 feet by Thursday.
Hurricane Ridge stands 5,242 feet above sea level; Mount Angeles, 6,453 feet; Mount Storm King, 4,534 feet.
The state Department of Ecology said the storm had reduced the drought classification of Washington from 68 percent of the state in late October to 48 percent Friday.
Still expecting low snowpack
However, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration said it was premature to predict if the storm signaled a shift from NOAA’s long-range forecast of a wet but warm El Niño winter.
“The prospects of the statewide snowpack drought ending anytime soon are not good,” said Ecology’s website Saturday.
“Forecasts remain for a warmer-than-normal winter and below-normal snowfall.”
As of Saturday, the Olympics’ snow water equivalent — the amount of water in the snow on the ground — stood at 70 percent of average.
Little flooding
As the weekend passed, emergency managers and electricity providers found themselves all stressed up with few places to go after they fixed scattered road closures and power outages that started around midday Thursday.
The incidents tapered off instead of increasing exponentially as they’d been expected to do.
The flood watch that had been predicted to last until 10 a.m. today was canceled at 6:15 a.m. Saturday for Clallam, Jefferson and Grays Harbor counties.
Only one river showed significant flooding. The Bogachiel was gauged at about 40 feet near LaPush at midday Friday, about 3 feet above its banks, and closed state Highway 110. By 11 a.m. Saturday, it stood at less than 32 feet.
Meanwhile, the Elwha River south of U.S. Highway 101 flooded slightly more than 1 inch Friday before dropping.
A U.S. Geological Survey team took the opportunity to measure sediments stirred up by the storm before the Elwha receded.
The forecasts Saturday still warned of perils — a continuing increased chance of landslides along the Strait of Juan de Fuca, Hood Canal and Admiralty Inlet; small craft warnings in the Strait until tonight; and high surf warnings on the Pacific coast until noon today.
All power restored
But no new power outages or road closures were reported Saturday, and the most recent two highway problems — fallen trees across U.S. Highway 101 at Milepost 319 and high water across state Highway 112 from Milepost 23 to Milepost 29 — had been fixed by Saturday morning.
At the height of the heavy weather, about 3,900 Clallam County Public Utility District customers had lost power Thursday and Friday from Neah Bay to Diamond Point — 2,500 of them in SunLand due to what the PUD called a “blink” in the Bonneville Power Administration supply.
In Jefferson County, trees fell into power lines at Cape George, West Valley, Eaglemount, Gardiner, Discovery Bay, South Hastings and Marrowstone Island, but all power had been restored by Friday morning. The utility classified all the outages as minor.
Moderate tide levels also kept damages down, although a sailboat at John Wayne Marina was blown from its anchorage and driven onto the rocks near the south parking lot.
No injuries were blamed on the storm.
On toward Snoqualmie
As the storm seemed to start abating Friday, Jefferson County Emergency Services Manager Bob Hamlin said it hadn’t lived up to its advance billing.
It had done much less damage than the Aug. 29 windstorm he said was premature for a big blow, and far from the standard of severity set last Dec. 9-11.
Weather radar showed the storm reaching the Cascade Mountain divide early Saturday afternoon while still extending hundreds of miles beyond the Washington coast.
It was moving to the northeast, followed by another storm westward in the North Pacific.
Along the western slope of the Cascades, as many as 5,000 residents were without power Friday morning, but those had dropped to 300 Friday night.
By tonight, forecasters said another foot of snow may have fallen in the Cascades since Saturday afternoon
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Reporter James Casey can be reached at 360-452-2345, ext. 5074, or at jcasey@peninsuladailynews.com.
