Snow followed by warm rain is the classic flood pattern in Western Washington. But weather forecasters for Snohomish County say current snow conditions are no cause for alarm.
The National Weather Service has issued flood watch advisories for six counties, most of them on the Olympic Peninsula, but Snohomish County was not included.
Unless the county gets more than the predicted 1 to 2 inches of rain, a flood watch here won’t be necessary, said hydrologist Brent Bower of the National Weather Service.
"The main determining factor will be the amount of rainfall we get the rest of this week," Bower said.
However, some urban flooding is expected as small streams and storm drains back up when the 4 to 5 inches of snow that fell along the I-5 corridor on Tuesday begins to melt sometime today.
The bigger rivers should be able to handle that amount of snow, Bower said.
A flood watch in Snohomish County is always a possibility, Bower said, so the weather service will revisit that forecast today once forecasters get a better picture of the amount of rainfall expected.
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