Nice start to the workweek followed by increasing shower chances
Sunday, October 18, 2026
Temperatures are just below 65 degrees with mostly sunny skies in Steamboat Springs this Sunday mid-afternoon. After a nice start to the workweek, shower chances increase from the moisture associated with yet another decaying hurricane, our third so far this year, and depend upon the evolution of a Gulf of Alaska trough and its interaction with the hurricane. Next weekend’s weather outlook will depend on how these features interact, and the eventual effects of another storm moving through the Gulf of Alaska.
A storm off the Vancouver coast is splitting, with the southern part of the storm forecast to form an eddy off the California coast by Tuesday. Additionally, a weak area of low pressure lies over the southern California border, and Hurricane Trudy is south of the Baja Peninsula.
As the Vancouver storm elongates southward, southwest winds ahead of the storm will carry the Southern California low northeastward, bringing some clouds and a small chance of a shower late Monday afternoon. High temperatures will once again rise to the low-to-mid 60s, above our 58-degree average.
Similar weather is forecast for Tuesday, before moisture from the northward-moving Hurricane Trudy is ingested into the southwest winds ahead of the developing California eddy.
Meanwhile, a ridge of high pressure over Texas starts building by midweek, just as the California eddy begins moving eastward. While the forecast initially called for likely rain around or soon after midweek for a day or two, the Texas ridge may complicate the eddy’s movement and its interaction with the remnants of Trudy, perhaps slowing or splitting the eddy.
The ridge will be close enough for another several degrees of warming on Wednesday, with shower chances later in the day dependent upon the proximity of the eddy. Similar uncertainty extends into Thursday, with another Gulf of Alaska storm crossing the Vancouver coast and adding additional forecast uncertainty for the end of the workweek and the weekend.
Until then, the local trails have dried out nicely behind last week’s storm, so enjoy the pleasant weather to start the workweek, and I’ll have more details on the evolving storms in my next regularly scheduled weather narrative on Thursday afternoon.
