Sudden weather change capsizes boats, leaves thousands without power

It was so hot out when 14-year-old Adi Vannice arrived for a sailing regatta at Leschi Marina Saturday morning that she decided to forgo the wet suit she usually wore.

As it turned out, the wetsuit would have come in handy. When afternoon gusts blew through what had been a spectacularly sunny day, the Olympia teen’s sailing dinghy overturned.

“The water was really cold,” Vannice said.

While dinghies overturn all the time, this plunge into Lake Washington was more unpleasant. She and her sailing partner kind of “freaked out,” she said, as they struggled to right the boat. They couldn’t manage it in the cold and the wind. Their coaches finally came and got them.

In fact, so many other dinghies capsized at the regatta, which drew eight school teams from around the region, that day one of this two-day event ended early.

All around the region, the sudden change in the weather took a toll, catching paddle boarders and at least one other sailor off guard. Thousands of people in Seattle and near Snohomish also lost power.

In the morning and early afternoon, it felt like summer. The temperature reached 72 degrees at Seattle-Tacoma International Airport around 1 p.m., according to National Weather Service meteorologist Jacob DeFlitch. People flocked to parks and took to the water.

But by mid-afternoon, a cold front blew through. The temperature dropped below 60 degrees. Winds ranged from 30 to 40 mph in most of Western Washington and got even more powerful in select spots. On Whidbey Island, the winds got up to 52 mph.

The winds tapered down in a few hours. But before they did, they caused some havoc.

Near Seward Park, three paddle boarders were reported in distress about 3:30 p.m. A kayaker helped one paddle boarder to shore, and a boater helped another.

A third paddle boarder was about 300 feet offshore when Seattle fire crews arrived, according to spokesperson Kaila Lafferty. A Seattle Fire Department rescue swimmer swam to that paddle boarder, and with help from a nearby boat, brought that person to shore, too. No one was hurt, Lafferty said.

Around the same time, a small single-person sailboat capsized in Lake Washington between south Mercer Island and Gene Coulon Memorial Beach Park in Renton. A jet skier helped that sailor to shore, said Katie Lewis, a spokesperson for Renton Regional Fire Authority. Lewis said the sailor was wearing a life vest and was uninjured.

Meanwhile, up to 11,000 people lost power in Seattle, primarily on the South End and in West Seattle, said Seattle City Light spokesperson Jenn Strang. While investigators were still determining the cause in the late afternoon, she said, “there is a strong assumption this was weather related.”

By around 8 p.m., the utility had restored power to all but 2,500 people.

More than 4,000 people lost power near Snohomish, most in a rural area known as Three Lakes. Tree limbs falling on power lines were the likely culprit, said Snohomish PUD spokesperson Aaron Swaney. At 8 p.m., about 800 people were still without power.

Cooler temperatures are expected to continue through Sunday, with a high of about 57 degrees and a few showers, but no strong winds.

That’s good news for Vannice, the Olympia teen, who planned to return to Leschi in the morning, ready to sail.