Strong Wind — East Puget Sound Lowlands, Washington
2014-11-06 · East Puget Sound Lowlands, Washington
Event narrative
A tree fell on a semi on Highway 530 near Oso on Thursday afternoon and trapped the driver inside, according to the State Patrol. The man was airlifted to Harborview Medical Center with critical injuries. There were about 5000 customers without power.
Wider weather episode
A deep but filling low moved northeast across central Vancouver Island. The KPDX-KBLI gradient reached about +10 with the KOLM-KBLI portion about 2/3 of that. There was brief high wind in several zones.
At the storm's peak, more than 14,000 Puget Sound Energy customers were without electricity, with the worst outages in Whatcom, Skagit and Island counties. On Thursday evening, more than 3,000 Seattle City Light customers were without power, most from an outage in Shoreline caused by a downed tree.
From a Seattle Times article:
A storm with high winds Thursday caused power outages across the Puget Sound region and downed power lines and trees, including one that injured a semitruck driver in Snohomish County and another that trapped a man in North Seattle.
Gusts of more than 40 mph were reported in the Seattle area, with a peak of 44 mph recorded about three miles west of Des Moines, according to the National Weather Service.
The strongest winds were recorded in the northern interior and North Coast from a 'pretty vigorous system' that came in from the Pacific Ocean, meteorologist Johnny Burg said. The weather service issued a high-wind warning for the area. Destruction Island, off the North Coast, reported gusts of 63 mph, while Paine Field in Everett had a peak of 51 mph and a sustained wind of 39 mph.
A tree fell on a semi on Highway 530 near Oso on Thursday afternoon and trapped the driver inside, according to the State Patrol. The man was airlifted to Harborview Medical Center with critical injuries. Highway 530 just west of 310th Street Northeast was blocked in both directions for about an hour before it opened to alternating traffic around 5 p.m.
Firefighters in Seattle's Bitter Lake neighborhood rescued a man trapped by a downed tree there. The man was taken to Harborview in stable condition with no visible injuries, according to the Seattle Fire Department.
Fallen trees were reported from Bellevue to Bainbridge Island to Sedro-Woolley and were responsible for many of the Seattle City Light and Puget Sound Energy outages throughout the day.
At the storm's peak, more than 14,000 Puget Sound Energy customers were without electricity, with the worst outages in Whatcom, Skagit and Island counties. On Thursday evening, more than 3,000 Seattle City Light customers were without power, most from an outage in Shoreline caused by a downed tree.
Washington State Ferries canceled two afternoon runs between Port Townsend and Coupeville because of high winds.
Source: NOAA Storm Events Database, event_id 544870. Narrative written by the NWS forecast office that issued the report.