Mail Tribune News - Showers, cold will continue

Mail Tribune (Medford, OR — Wayback)

2001-03-09

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Showers, cold will continue A winter storm that parked over Southern Oregon for most of the weekend could make for icy travel early today. Forecasters expected snow levels to fall to 1,500 feet Sunday night as temperatures slid toward the upper 20s. An additional two to four inches of snow was expected over the Siskiyou Summit and in the Cascades. Oregon State Police reported spots of ice on Interstate 5 at Siskiyou Summit at 9 p.m. Sunday. Packed snow was reported on Highways 62, 66, and 140 over the Cascades, and drivers were advised to carry chains. The storm that brought two days of steady rain and drizzle to the Rogue Valley was expected to move east by afternoon, after dropping more than a foot of new snow on Mount Ashland and six inches on Mount Shasta. The storm "just stagnated and sat," said Roger Gerig, of the National Weather Service's Medford station. Medford received .18 inches of rain for the 24-hour period up to 5 p.m. Sunday. Cold air moving in behind the storm held Sunday's high temperature to 40 degrees, 18 degrees below the average high for March 5. Gerig said showers were expected to diminish by late afternoon, and a bit of sunshine might appear. "It should look quite a bit better in the afternoon and temperatures will get back toward 50 again," Gerig said. Gerig said the cold spell is typical for early March. "That's what we get this time of year -- those extremes -- the 70-degree days and the 40-degree days, and they kind of average out." He said another storm could arrive as early as Tuesday evening. Today's Edition : News | Sports | Business | Weather | Tempo | Classifieds Mail Tribune Copyright � The Mail Tribune 2000, Medford, Oregon USA