Monsoonal moisture will be close, but will it be close enough?
Sunday, July 20, 2025
Temperatures are at our average of eighty-four degrees with mostly sunny skies this Sunday mid-afternoon in Steamboat Springs, with similar temperatures expected through the workweek. While shower chances return Monday and last through the workweek, accumulating rain chances are marginal and will ultimately depend on how close we are to a plume of monsoonal moisture.
Dry air between an area of low pressure over Vancouver and high pressure centered over the Gulf of Mexico has temporarily interrupted our spotty flow of monsoon moisture since Thursday. Clockwise winds rotating around the high pressure will keep moist southwest flow near our area this week, with shower chances returning on Monday as some energy from a weakening eddy over southern Nevada mixes into the flow and encroaches on the dry air now overhead.
There may be better shower chances on Tuesday and Tuesday night if the eddy is absorbed into the southwest flow and passes overhead, but that will depend upon the ultimate track of the eddy, which is uncertain at this time.
Meanwhile, the Vancouver low pressure is forecast to elongate southward along the West Coast through Tuesday, eventually forming an eddy over northern California by midweek. The southwest winds ahead of the low pressure will carry dry air from well off the coast of California over the Great Basin, but our area should still be east of that dry air on Wednesday and Thursday for continued shower chances.
Current weather forecast models are not optimistic about accumulating rain over the four days of shower chances, but that could change depending on the track of moisture and energy in the southwest flow. But by Friday, Pacific energy moving through the Gulf of Alaska will expand the hot and dry weather over the Great Basin eastward, reducing shower chances and raising high temperatures towards ninety degrees by Saturday.
Enjoy the average summertime temperatures this week, hope for productive showers producing more rain than currently forecast, and check back to my next regularly scheduled weather narrative on Thursday afternoon for more details on the weekend’s weather.
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