Critical fire threat and high heat today
Triple digits are not out of the question for the Wasatch Front, yesterday the Salt Lake International Airport briefly measured 101 degrees! While the afternoon will start clear for most of us, we'll see increasing clouds coverage through the day. Breezy conditions are expected ahead of an incoming dry cold front, that coupled with the dry vegetation and low relative humidity means fire conditions are critical.
Red Flag Warnings are in effect for the entire state, apart from Summit County. Conditions will generally be similar across the board with southwest winds at 10-25 mph gusting up to 35-40 mph and humidity in the 8-15% range, but the timing varies. The West Desert and Mojave Desert, including St. George and Cedar City, will expire at 9 pm tonight. The northern West Desert, Wasatch Front, and the Wasatch Mountains will also expire at 9 pm. Warnings hold on in eastern and south-central Utah through tomorrow. The Four Corners region, East Uinta Basin, and Book Cliffs' warning expires on Friday at 8 pm. Just an hour later at 9 pm Friday the last of the warnings expire which make up the largest area and includes places like the San Rafael Swell, Grand Staircase, Color Country Mountains, West Uinta Basin, and Central Mountains where the Monroe Canyon Fire is still burning ROUGHLY 65,000 ACRES.
While alerts in southwest Utah expire tonight, there will still be a critical fire threat from the southwest and through eastern Utah into Saturday thanks to gusty winds. The reason we see elevated winds in parts of central, southern and eastern Utah is linked to the progression of an incoming cold front. This dry cold front will move through northern Utah into Friday night before stalling, bringing decreasing winds by the weekend and a noticeable drop in temperatures, especially in the north. We could see a day or two in the mid to upper 80s, which would be a nice change from the summer heat.
We'll keep you updated on the latest developments in our 4Warn forecast both on-air and online, we are Good4Utah!
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