Increasing chances of rain for the weekend
Monday, June 11, 2018
The storm that brought a cool front through the Steamboat Springs area last night and pleasant near-normal temperatures this Monday is passing to our northeast, ahead of another storm forecast to cross the Pacific Northwest coast later Tuesday. This storm looks to eventually conspire with the remnants of hurricane Bud currently well south of Baja to bring a good chance of wetting rains for a part of the weekend.
Tuesday will be similar to today before winds turn to the southwest ahead of the Pacific Northwest storm. This storm is forecast to mix with some cool air from the North Pole by tomorrow and split as it makes landfall in the Pacific Northwest late Tuesday. Some of the storm will continue to the northeast, but a large part of the storm will be left behind in the northern Great Basin. The southwest winds ahead of the storm will again cause the hot and dry weather we experienced last week for Wednesday.
But there may be some modest moisture drawn northward form the Mexican Plateau for the end of the work week as the storm loiters in the northern Great Basin, and this would increase the chance of afternoon showers. Deeper moisture likely arrives around mid-weekend as current hurricane Bud moves northward through the work week. Note it is rather unusual to have a late spring storm that contains some cool air from the North Pole and tropical moisture from a hurricane.
As might be imagined, there is a fair bit of uncertainty with the timing of these pieces, but right now I would guess that we’ll see a twelve hour period that contains some good rains, probably around late Saturday or early Sunday , with afternoon showers increasing late in the work week and into the weekend as the remnants of hurricane Bud near.
The Great Basin storm is forecast to wobble in place through at least the early part of next week, and the unseasonably cold storm looks to continue the chance of at least afternoon showers through then.
At this point, it is not clear if the storm will remain strong enough to bring a cool front through our area around midweek, as it is battling the strong warming from a sun approaching the summer solstice on Thursday, June 21.
