Warm water and air and unusual weather conditions tracing back as far as tropical cyclone flooding in Indonesia helped supercharge stubborn atmospheric rivers that have drenched Washington state with almost 5 trillion gallons (19 trillion liters) of rain in the past seven days, threatening record flood levels, meteorologists said.
The worst and most persistent of the heavy rains will linger to douse the same location through late Thursday and early Friday morning before the river of moisture should lessen and move around a bit. But the West Coast likely won't see an end to the “fire hose” of moisture until the week of Christmas, said Matt Jeglum, acting science chief for the National Weather Service’s western region.
