A surface low and attendant cold front moving across the area produced moderate to heavy snow showers. Heavier snow totals were noted across the Blue mountains and Wallowa county where the low and cold front interacted with terrain, producing locally heavy snow accumulations the 17th through the morning of the 18th.
Every event with a place to put it; 2 filed by county or forecast zone are drawn at its center, in a lighter ring. Tap one for its entry below.
Deaths and injuries are direct and indirect together, as the offices filed them. Damage is property and crops in the dollars of the year, not adjusted for inflation, and only where an office estimated it.
The episode as NWS PDT wrote it up.
A surface low and attendant cold front moving across the area produced moderate to heavy snow showers. Heavier snow totals were noted across the Blue mountains and Wallowa county where the low and cold front interacted with terrain, producing locally heavy snow accumulations the 17th through the morning of the 18th.
The local office's own words before the first event, as it sent them, from the Iowa Environmental Mesonet's archive of National Weather Service text.
NWS Pendleton, OR wrote its last area forecast discussion before the first event at Feb 15, 9:46 PM PST, 6 hours 14 minutes earlier.
Area Forecast Discussion
National Weather Service Pendleton OR
946 PM PST Sun Feb 15 2026
.Updated for Aviation...
&&
.DISCUSSION...
Fog continues to impact the areas this afternoon, after having
improving visibility in central Oregon, the foothills of the
Blue Mountains have experienced sub one quarter mile visibility
all morning. There had been a slight improvement based on
webcams in the Cabbage Hill/Deadman Pass area as rain showers
have moved through the area winds around noon. However as the
rains passed the conditions again deteriorated with a sustained
upslope wind component. A dense fog advisory has been issued as
well for that area of the Oregon Northern Blue Mountain
Foothills through midnight.
NBM 25th to 75th percentile snowfall is 6 to 8 inches respectively,
and providing fairly high confidence for advisory level snow at
the Santiam pass level ending sometime Tuesday. Winter Weather
Advisories will be posted for the period from midnight Tonight
through Tuesday night, for the eastern slopes of the Oregon
Cascades, and from 4 am Monday through the end of the afternoon
on Wednesday for the Northern Blue Mountains of Oregon and
Washington.
The atmospheric river trends southward into CA and the sw US,
which doesn't favor higher moisture content, which is reflected
in the declining PWAT values though the week. Countering this
is the invasion of much colder air aloft where 500 mb temps go
from -25C to -35 C Monday Night into Tuesday anchoring over the
region for the remainder of the week driving snow to liquid
ratios higher to the 15 to 20:1 range through the mountain
zones. Snow ratios drop to under 1000 ft by the Wednesday night,
promoting chances for snow accumulations as well in some of the
highland valleys, and areas away from the foothills, and
continue to crash to near the surface even in the Columbia
Basin. This should lead to at least a rain snow mix chance for
most of the low lands by Thursday.
Additional snows are anticipated for the Wednesday and Thursday
time frame, and additional advisories may be needed. The
uncertainty is high with respect to afternoon and even overnight
temperatures heading into the middle of the week. While the NBM
does cool highs to the upper 30s by Thursday afternoon through
the River Gorge and across the Lower Columbia Basin , the colder
members of the ensembles would suggest even highs in the upper
20s across the foothills of the Blues. Russell/71
&&
.AVIATION /06Z TAFS THROUGH 06Z TUESDAY/...
Conditions are expected to deteriorate again overnight into
Monday morning. BDN and RDM have already decreased to LIFR.
Most other sites are MVFR or IFR and will come down further. -RA
is also expected to move in toward morning and continue through
much of the day. Improvement is possible toward the end of the
TAF period.
&&
.Preliminary Point Temps/PoPs...
PDT 34 44 27 44 / 30 90 60 30
ALW 37 46 30 45 / 40 90 70 50
PSC 35 46 29 48 / 30 80 30 10
YKM 32 43 24 42 / 10 60 10 10
HRI 36 46 28 47 / 30 80 40 10
ELN 28 39 22 37 / 10 50 20 30
RDM 30 44 22 38 / 30 60 20 30
LGD 33 49 25 40 / 30 90 90 70
GCD 33 47 24 38 / 20 80 80 70
DLS 38 45 29 44 / 30 80 40 50
&&
.PDT WATCHES/WARNINGS/ADVISORIES...
WA...Winter Weather Advisory from 4 AM Monday to 3 PM PST Wednesday
for WAZ030.
OR...Winter Weather Advisory from 4 AM Monday to 3 PM PST Wednesday
for ORZ502.
Dense Fog Advisory until midnight PST tonight for ORZ507.
Winter Weather Advisory until 10 PM PST Tuesday for ORZ509.
Dense Fog Advisory until noon PST Tuesday for ORZ511.
&&
UPDATE...97
DISCUSSION...71
AVIATION...77The national radar mosaic for the moment the first event began.
2 heavy snow. Local standard time, as filed.
The High Ridge SNOTEL measured 10 inches of new snow in a 42 hour period ending at 0100 PST on Feb. 18th. A social media post from the Tollgate area reported 14 inches of storm total snowfall at 1116 on Feb. 18th.
A member of the public 7 miles southeast of Joseph, OR reported 14.5 inches of new snow in a 24 hour period ending at 1000 PST on the 18th. A member of the public in Wallowa reported 7 inches of new snow in a 24 hour period ending at 0800 PST on the 18th.
After NWS Directive 10-1605, the rules offices file Storm Data by.
Every storm in Oregon in 2026Every state in 2026This day in weather historyWarnings in Oregon, February 2026
NOAA National Centers for Environmental Information, Storm Events Database, compiled from the National Weather Service’s monthly Storm Data. Complete through 2026-06; NCEI adds each month about 75 days after it ends and revises past years a few times a year. Rebuilt 2026-09-24. Each event’s entry at NCEI: 1320760, 1320759.