


Area Forecast Discussion
Issued by NWS Spokane, WA
Issued by NWS Spokane, WA
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133 FXUS66 KOTX 060529 AFDOTX Area Forecast Discussion National Weather Service Spokane WA 1029 PM PDT Sat Jul 5 2025 .KEY MESSAGES... - Isolated (10-15%) afternoon showers and thunderstorms across the northern Mtns and N ID this afternoon and early evening. - Hot temperatures arrive Monday and continue into at least Wednesday. - Increased winds and elevated fire weather conditions Wednesday. && .DISCUSSION... The progressive shortwave that supported light showers across the area this morning continues to move off to our east this afternoon. Meanwhile, another progressive wave is moving through this afternoon and evening and will try to utilize the what`s left of the moisture in concert with instability (100-300 j/kg) to support a few showers and storms (10-15% chance) across the northern Mtns and N ID. Attention then turns to the upper air pattern as ridging will slowly start to build tomorrow and amplify as it moves overhead Monday and Tuesday before breaking down Wednesday. As the area trends warmer and dryer, heat and fire will remain the chief concerns. There is good agreement when looking at ensemble clusters of the ridge dominating Monday and Tuesday and quickly becoming zonal Wednesday. Heat wise, moderate to major heatRisk is possible Monday through Wednesday. Temperature spread is quite low Monday and Tuesday of 3-5 degrees, however there is increased uncertainty on Wednesday where the spread increases to 7-10 degrees across much of the area. The highest heat confidence lies across greater Columbia Basin where spread is the least (1-3 degrees) with Tuesday max temperatures approaching the upper 90s to around 100 degrees. Wind gusts Tuesday include a 25-75th percentile range of 25-35 mph across portions of central WA while the area of elevated winds expands east across E WA and N ID on Wednesday. The heat and wind potential in concert with relative humidities falling to the teens Mon-Wed will result in elevated (Mon/Tue), to potentially critical fire conditions (Wed). The GEFS hot, dry, windy (HDWI) indices continue to increase with nearly all members at or above the 90th percentile for Tuesday with some uncertainty still showing up Wednesday though now ranging between the 75th and 95th HDWI percentiles. This period will continue to be monitored closely as we move into next week. && .AVIATION... 06Z TAFS: Bands of midlevel clouds are passing through the region at this hour, otherwise VFR skies are expected through the TAF period with generally light winds. Main winds near 10kts will be locally around KEAT. FORECAST CONFIDENCE AND/OR ALTERNATE SCENARIOS: Patchy low clouds or fog is possible between Sandpoint and Bonners Ferry where heavier rains fell into Saturday. Current observations indicate Sandpoint is near saturation. Any fog will burn off quickly Sunday morning./sb ----------------------- 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. && $$