935
FXUS66 KOTX 051117
AFDOTX

Area Forecast Discussion
National Weather Service Spokane WA
417 AM PDT Sat Jul 5 2025

.KEY MESSAGES...

- Morning showers over Eastern Washington and North Idaho on
  Saturday.

- Isolated afternoon showers and thunderstorms along the
  Canadian border Saturday afternoon.

- Hot temperatures arrive Monday and continue into at least
  Wednesday.

- Increased winds and elevated fire weather conditions
  Wednesday.

&&

.SYNOPSIS...
Showers and clouds will slowly dissipate Saturday morning with
clear to partly cloudy skies in the afternoon. Isolated showers
and thunderstorms redevelop near the Canadian border Saturday
afternoon. Warming and drying trend Monday through Wednesday.
Increasing winds late Tuesday into Wednesday to bring increased
fire weather concerns.

&&

.DISCUSSION...
Today-tonight: A midlevel low will track east out of the Inland NW
today. Morning showers over North Idaho and far Eastern WA will
dissipate around midday with areas of sunshine returning in the
afternoon. A secondary wave sweeping across central BC will
provide a renewed area of lift, interacting with (100-500 K/kg)
SBCAPE along the Canadian border resulting in redeveloping
showers and t-storms. A bulk of the CAPE will be centered below
-10C which leads to low confidence for lightning and HREF
 calibrated lightning probabilities are in the range of 10-20%
 across northern Okanogan, Ferry, Stevens, Pend Oreille, and
 Boundary county. Cells in northern Okanogan/Ferry County would
 likely be early afternoon then mainly late afternoon/early
 evening threat for points eastward. Cells that do develop will
 track to the east and northeast back into Canada around 15-20
 mph. For Central WA and much of the Columbia Basin, the main
 story will be breezy west to southwest winds gusting 15 to 20
 mph coupled with dry conditions and an abundance of sunshine.
 Winds through the Cascade river valleys and on to the
 Waterville Plateau will increase further by the evening with
 west to northwest wind gusts near 30 mph. Clear skies return
 region- wide Saturday night with winds decreasing hour by hour,
 becoming light and under 10 mph prior to sunrise on Sunday.

Sunday - Wednesday:  Zonal flow on Sunday will give way to height
rises for early next week with high confidence for another
warming and drying trend. National Blend of Model forecast high
temperatures have come down a few degrees, especially for
Wednesday but still remain very warm with temperatures returning
to the mid 90s to low 100s by Tuesday. Heat risk indicators
ramp up from minor heat risk Sunday into moderate heat risk
Monday and moderate to major heat risk Tuesday. Needless to say,
folks should prepare now for another bout of summer heat.

As for fire weather concerns, the combination of heat and lower
atmosphere unstable conditions will lead to elevated fire
weather conditions for Sunday and Monday with little to no
concerns for significant wind impacts. Concerns increase going
into Tuesday and Wednesday as the next trough approaches and
begins to break down the heat. There are several variations in
the ensemble packages how this will transpire which will have
major ramifications on timing of winds and alignment with the
driest humidities. General consensus with ensemble means are for
gap winds to begin to bleed through starting on Tuesday, most
likely late in the day or evening. By Wednesday, 75% of the
ensembles support a more pronounced flattening of the ridge.
This will need to be monitored very closely as pattern
recognition indicates the potential for a critical fire weather
day. Looking into some of the finer details from the European
Ensembles, all but 2 of 50 ENS members have gusts of 30 mph or
stronger at Wenatchee AP and 25-30 mph for locations like Moses
Lake, Spokane, and Pullman. GEFS is not as strong at this time
and this is reflected in the hot, dry, windy plots that range
from the values of 500 to 100 or 95th percentile to 25th
percentile. All things considered, Wednesday will be a day to
watch very closely in the coming days!

Thursday into next weekend: Details for late week heading into
the weekend are uncertain as models suggest a progressive
pattern with periods of ridging and troughs. General consensus
is for a dip in the temperatures around Thursday then warming
back up for 1-3 days before another dip however timing the waves
and depths is proving very challenging and resulting in large
spreads in the temperatures by as much as 10 to 15 degrees.
Projected highs vary anywhere from the low 80s to low 100s.
While some ensembles indicate ribbons of moisture at times, its
hard to excited for any appreciable precipitation and moisture
this time. As each warming period breaks down, it is likely that
there will be periods of winds so overall, looks like we will
remain in elevated fire weather conditions and continue to
increase fire danger indices until there is evidence otherwise.
/sb

&&

.AVIATION...
12Z TAFS: Moisture wrapping around a broad low pressure system
is delivering light rain to North Idaho ad Northeast Washington.
Spokane-Cd`A will have intermittent showers through 17Z. Cigs
are generally around 5-6k ft AGL with few-sct coverage as low
as 3k ft AGL. There is a 20-30% chance for isolated showers to
cross through SE WA and NC ID south of the main precip band
passing through LWS-PUW. The exception will be along the
Canadian border where a renewed threat for convective showers
and small threat for thunderstorms (20%) will exist btwn 21-03z.
Light winds are expected region- wide Saturday with infrequent
afternoon gusts around 15-20 kts.

FORECAST CONFIDENCE AND/OR ALTERNATE SCENARIOS: Moderate to
high confidence in conditions remaining VFR. There is a 10-20%
chance for brief MVFR cigs around Bonners Ferry, Sandpoint where
steadier rains fell this evening. Main threat for convective
showers and isolated t-storms Sat afternoon will be from
Oroville to Bonners Ferry. /JDC

-----------------------

Confidence descriptors:
Low - Less than a 30 percent chance
Moderate - 30 to 70 percent chance
High - Greater than a 70 percent chance

For additional probabilistic information for NWS Spokane
airports, please refer to the Aviation Dashboard on our
webpage: https:/www.weather.gov/otx/avndashboard

&&

.Preliminary Point Temps/PoPs...
Spokane        80  56  85  56  92  60 /  40   0   0   0   0   0
Coeur d`Alene  76  55  85  56  90  60 /  60  10   0   0   0   0
Pullman        76  49  82  51  89  57 /  10   0   0   0   0   0
Lewiston       85  60  91  61  98  65 /  10   0   0   0   0   0
Colville       79  47  85  48  90  51 /  40  10   0   0   0   0
Sandpoint      72  51  81  49  88  55 /  70  10   0   0   0   0
Kellogg        72  57  80  58  87  63 /  50  10   0   0   0   0
Moses Lake     87  55  90  57  95  60 /   0   0   0   0   0   0
Wenatchee      87  60  90  63  95  68 /   0   0   0   0   0   0
Omak           86  56  89  58  95  60 /  10   0   0   0   0   0

&&

.OTX WATCHES/WARNINGS/ADVISORIES...
WA...None.
ID...None.

&&

$$