Shower chances linger through midweek ahead of increasingly hot weather
Sunday, July 3, 2022
After a brief rain shower around noon in Steamboat Springs, skies have turned mostly sunny with temperatures in the mid-seventies and relative humidities still above forty percent this Sunday mid-afternoon. Shower chances will decrease for Independence Day before increasing again on Tuesday and Wednesday before drier air invades and temperatures rise as we head into next weekend.
A storm is currently spinning over the Pacific Northwest coast while an expansive ridge of high pressure sits over the southeast and extends through the Midwest. Winds from the southwest ahead of the storm to our northwest and on the backside of the ridge of high pressure to our east has brought good moisture from the south over our area in a classic monsoon pattern. But just because the moisture is around does not mean it will rain, though if it does rain it can come in brief and locally heavy cloudbursts. For example, areas around town quickly received between a third and half inch of rain on Thursday and between one and two tenths of an inch on Friday, while yesterday was almost completely dry.
Today has been relatively active as some upper level energy caught in the overhead southwest flow encourages storm development, with shower chances continuing into the evening.
Some energy ejecting out of the Pacific Northwest storm will pass well to our northwest tomorrow, but will nudge the high pressure to the east and bend the plume of monsoonal moisture away from our area on Independence Day, for another downturn in shower chances.
The ridge of high pressure and associated monsoonal moisture plume rebounds back to the west behind the ejecting energy to our northwest, with an increase in storm activity likely for Tuesday and Wednesday.
Meanwhile additional cold air from the North Pole moving through the Bering Sea is forecast to eventually boot the Pacific Northwest storm bodily eastward along the Canadian border by the end of the work week. And this time, very dry air from off the coast of California behind the storm looks to overspread our area and at least temporarily shut off the monsoonal moisture tap. So look for much drier days after midweek with temperatures increasing from the low-eighties on Thursday, mid-eighties on Friday and perhaps ninety by Saturday, which would be above our average high temperature of 83 F.
Enjoy the rest of the long holiday weekend, and be sure to check back for my next regularly scheduled weather narrative on Thursday afternoon where I’ll see if Saturday is still looking like it will be the hottest day of the summer so far.
