Temperatures to soar again in Southwest, ramping up fire concerns
Extreme heat will return to the scorched region, and as temperatures tick up, so too will wildfire dangers.
From newly energized monsoon conditions in the Southwest to a system of storms racing across the Plains, the end of July and the start of August were stormy for a wide swath of the U.S.
Following a slow start to the fire season in the western United States, blazes have been igniting across many states in the last couple of weeks due to the extreme heat and the return of monsoon thunderstorms and the lightning that they yield. Fires and the fire whirl that they have spawned are forcing evacuations and also threatening iconic ecosystems such as the Joshua trees.
AccuWeather meteorologists say that heat will once again ramp up across the Southwest this weekend, following the downturn in temperatures from Monday to Wednesday. The pattern will continue to promote daily thunderstorms across portions of the West in the coming days, but the main focus of the lightning storms will soon shift to different zones farther to the north.
This weekend, areas of Southern California, Nevada, Arizona and southern New Mexico will trend drier than earlier this week as a dome of high pressure builds westward over the Southwest once again. The weather setup over the South Central and Southwest states will allow temperatures to climb between 5 and 15 degrees Fahrenheit above the historical averages in the coming days.
Residents across Texas, New Mexico, Arizona and southeastern California will notice the gradual uptick in temperatures through at least the end of the weekend as dry conditions move in. Forecasters say that temperatures in cities in New Mexico such as Santa Fe and Carlsbad are likely to challenge daily record high temperatures by the end of this weekend.
Temperatures in Carlsbad are forecast to climb to around 105 F on Saturday and Sunday, coming within a few degrees of the daily records on both days. On Saturday, the current daily record is 107 F, while the Sunday daily temperature record for Carlsbad, New Mexico, is also 107 F, both set back in 2015.
In the south-central U.S., there will be numerous daily high temperatures challenged on Friday. Locations across Louisiana, such as Baton Rouge and New Orleans, are forecast to have record-breaking temperatures around 100 degrees both days, about 8-10 degrees above the historical averages for early August.
This comes after both cities reached new record high temperatures on Thursday, with highs of 101 degrees in Baton Rouge and 98 in New Orleans.
Phoenix has been at the center of the blistering heat, recently concluding a record stretch of consecutive days with highs of 110 degrees Fahrenheit or higher. July went down in the record books as the hottest month on record in the aptly nicknamed Valley of the Sun.
On Wednesday afternoon, temperatures reached 111 in Phoenix and initiated another string of days with highs of 110 or greater. Highs at or above the 110-degree mark may extend well into next week.
However, areas of California may not climb as high as the surrounding areas until later this weekend as the upper-level pattern hones in on the Southwest states.
"Temperatures across the Southwest have been running consistently 5 to as much as 10 degrees above historical averages since the middle of July, but cooler air will return to spots in California as the ridge [of high pressure] migrates slightly to the east," AccuWeather Senior Meteorologist Heather Zehr said.
Temperatures will be slightly below average in many places in California, Zehr explained. Cloud cover and storms suppressed temperatures in the southern California deserts early this week, but as the region turns rain-free, conditions will warm.
Moisture shifts northward across the Rocky Mountains
As the upper-level pattern shifts and high pressure builds over the Southwestern states, monsoon moisture will be displaced farther north across the northern Rockies, and a daily thunderstorm risk will expand from Colorado and Utah to Montana and Idaho.
"Monsoon moisture will shift back to the east and out of California, southern Nevada and western Arizona over the next couple of days, and the unusually high humidity that was in place will drop to more typical levels," explained Zehr.
According to the U.S. Drought Monitor, the northern half of Idaho and Montana are currently facing moderate to severe drought. As storms develop repeatedly this weekend and dampen the region, locations throughout the interior Northwest may experience some degree of drought relief.
Thunderstorms that develop throughout the northern Rocky Mountains and Colorado Rockies can supply drenching downpours through this weekend. Excessive rain in storms could flood area streams and some larger rivers in the region.
Elevated wildfire threat persists across the Northwest
While beneficial to the drought, the rain and thunderstorms will also bring numerous lightning strikes that could spark wildfires in the area. Especially given the dry conditions in the Northwest, the risk of wildfires will be elevated into next week.
As of Thursday, the total number of acres burned by wildfires to date in 2023 was 1,257,389, according to the National Interagency Fire Center. Several active fires are burning across Oregon, Washington and Idaho, creating an expansive zone of smoke from the far northwestern California coast to Montana and far northern Wyoming.
AccuWeather forecasters say that winds associated with thunderstorm outflow boundaries may gust up to 25-35 mph at times throughout the next few days, which could spread existing fires rapidly and make them difficult to control.
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