Bomb Cyclone!

So last night we returned briefly to the (literal) dark ages when a bomb cyclone arrived right behind an atmospheric river and hit Puget Sound in the early evening. Power went out for well over half a million people.

What is a bomb cyclone? The AP defines it this way:

…it largely concerns a swift drop in pressure. Atmospheric pressure is measured in millibars by the National Weather Service. If a storm decreases 24 millibars or more in 24 hours or less, it can be considered a bomb cyclone, said Stephen Baron, a forecaster with the weather service in Gray, Maine.

“I would say rapid intensification of hurricanes is one of the more common times we see it,” Baron said. “We do see it with Nor’easters occasionally.”

Here’s what was forecast for us:

(courtesy @zoom_earth on Threads)

Here’s what we got:

Apparently our bomb cyclone dropped 66 millibars in less than 24 hours. The winds were, well, pretty fucking windy. Off the coast it was hurricane force. In the lowlands, 77 mph. Around here I’m guessing it hit 55-60 mph. It was…interesting. Our power went out around 6 pm (I can’t remember exactly). We found flashlights and the nifty little square LED things we bought just a couple of months ago that attach magnetically or via carabiners or you can just hook over things or put flat on a table, turned on the gas fire and candles, and opened some wine. Later we heated up stew on our gas stove, followed by hot tea from water boiled in pan. (Not to self: buy stove kettle!)

As we’d had the forecast we had also had time to start charging our big power block that can run a bunch of things at once for a little while—but while it was useful for keeping our devices charged and running a portable heater if we needed it, those devices aren’t massively useful when cable goes out and, along with, it broadband. (We essentially have zero cell service here down at the bottom of a hill by the ravine—every now and again I’ll catch one bar or, gasp!, two, and be able to send a text, or post to Bluesky, but mostly when cable goes down, so do we.)

Here in western Washington the winds mostly come from the southwest. The bomb cyclone, on the other hand, pulled in air from the east. So all those tall conifers that are quite nonchalant about high winds because their roots are braced for it just fell like ninepins when the wind came roaring in from the east like a freight train.1 I’ve heard that least one woman was killed by a falling tree, and hundreds of thousands of Puget Sound Energy customers will be powerless “for multiple days.”

As you can probably guess from this post, we’re lucky: our power came back on early this morning. I’m glad. I’m creature of the 21st century: my wheelchairs run on electricity; our gas-powered water heater only reaches parts of the house because of an electric pump; our sump pump (which believe me we need when we get these atmospheric rivers dumping oceans of rain overnight) is electric; our gas furnace relies on electricity to blow the hot air through the vents; the modem and router; the microwave and kettle and toaster oven… On and on. And, oh, if there’s no real light to read paper books by and my Kindle runs out of juice? I am lost.

Our power outage lasted perhaps 12 hours. It was a cosy little adventure that was nonetheless disturbing: no electric hum anywhere; no streetlights; no electric blanket to keep warm. It was as though the rest of the world had vanished (but for the faint sound of sirens in the distance). The cats were seriously freaked out. But cats are creatures of the Eternal Now—today they’re fine. And so are we. But the first thing I’ll do if we ever win the lottery is get both a gas generator and a massive solar power/battery backup system. I like my creature comforts. And this kind of extreme weather is just going to start coming more often and more severely.

Today though: I’m grateful, and I wish speedy reconnection to all those without power.

If you’ve seen The Two Towers you may remember the ents destroying Isengard, bending forward and bracing against the just-released waters behind the dam. Now imagine the water suddenly rushing from the other direction: over they go… ︎