Western Washington faces 'catastrophic' flooding as two atmospheric rivers dump heavy rain
Western Washington braced for what the National Weather Service in Seattle called "catastrophic" conditions on Wednesday as an atmospheric river drenched the state.
The NWS forecasted major flooding for 17 rivers as rain persisted across the region. Parts of Northwest Oregon were also affected, with flood warnings in place for several rivers.
Governor Bob Ferguson declared a statewide emergency in response to the intense flooding. Several impacted counties also issued evacuation orders on Wednesday afternoon.
The ocean-crossing storms known as atmospheric rivers are not new; they are a major source of moisture up and down the West Coast every winter. However, climate scientists predict they will become more powerful, frequent, and prolonged as Earth's climate continues to warm.
The NWS predicted that rainfall would peak on Wednesday night, while some parts of Skagit County to the north may not experience the worst of the flooding until Thursday or Friday. The flooding is expected to surpass a record set in 1990, when floods caused two human fatalities, over 2,000 evacuations, and more than $100 million in damage, according to a Natural Disaster Survey Report.
Robert Ezelle, director of the Washington Military Department's Emergency Management Division, stated that up to 75,000 people living in low-lying areas of Skagit County could need to evacuate as early as Wednesday evening.
"We anticipate levees — not just on the Skagit River, but on many others — being over the top," Ezelle said. "We're hearing reports that the flood wall in Arlington could be overtopped."
Emergency responders were closely monitoring the Skagit River and surrounding areas on Wednesday, with widespread reports of flooded roads and evacuation orders. Communities in Snohomish and Pierce counties were told to evacuate. Skagit County also recommended evacuations for the towns of Rockport, Hamilton, Marblemount, and Concrete.
Governor Bob Ferguson stated that up to 100,000 Washingtonians could face evacuation orders. He emphasized that the situation is fluid and constantly changing, with rivers expected to reach historic levels as early as 4 a.m. the following day, lasting into Friday morning.
Governor Ferguson, speaking from the Emergency Operations Center at Camp Murray in Tacoma, requested an expedited emergency declaration from the federal government.
"Lives will be at stake in the coming days, and we need the federal government to do what's entirely appropriate here," Ferguson said. If granted, Ferguson said Washington would receive additional federal resources that could save lives.
A spokesperson for the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) confirmed that the agency is in touch with emergency management and tribal governments in Washington and Oregon. FEMA set up a communications hub in Bothell on Tuesday and started 24-hour operations on Wednesday to ensure an efficient flow of information between federal agencies and state and tribal governments. The agency also has two liaisons at the state Emergency Operations Center and is pre-positioning lifesaving capabilities in Washington state.
However, the Trump administration's decision to grant emergency funds is uncertain. In June, the president denied the state's request for major-disaster aid after severe weather caused by a bomb cyclone hit Western Washington in November 2024. The administration did not provide any explanation for the denial.
"We need the federal government to grant that request," Ferguson said. "This is critical."
The severity of the flooding was exacerbated by the fact that two atmospheric rivers swamped the region one after the other. Washington State Climatologist Guillaume Mauger noted that neither of this week's atmospheric rivers delivered record-breaking amounts of rain, but two arriving back-to-back has overwhelmed the region's rivers, offering a glimpse into our warmer future.
"The science is clear that floods will become larger and more frequent in the future," Mauger said. He predicted that extreme, once-a-century floods on the Skagit River could occur four times more often as soon as the 2040s.
A warmer atmosphere can hold and dump more moisture, and more of that precipitation is likely to fall as rain, not snow. "If there's less falling as snow and more falling as rain, that means there's more water that can end up directly in the rivers and contribute to flooding," Mauger explained.
According to the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, for every Celsius degree of human-caused warming, extreme storms over land are expected to dump 7% more precipitation.
