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Mountain West Discussion


Chinook
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Good Saturday morning western USA! There must be a pretty big wild fire near southern WY/northern CO border.  You can see the plume modeled in these graphics, as presented for 4-5 AM this morning, and then about the same time tomorrow morning (sinking southward). Plume origination points  are easily presented in the Mountains and CA. Some of you should be noticing smoke aloft this morning.

Finally I added a graphic for the W coast as developed by SPC yesterday... for early next week as critical fire danger risk increases with another huge west coast ridge. 

Fire is my concern...and it's plume impacts here in the east. So, i wasn't sure if anyone had seen graphics such as these.  Have a good day. 

 

 

Screen Shot 2020-09-26 at 7.40.13 AM.png

Screen Shot 2020-09-26 at 7.41.16 AM.png

Screen Shot 2020-09-26 at 7.42.52 AM.png

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1 hour ago, wdrag said:

Good Saturday morning western USA! There must be a pretty big wild fire near southern WY/northern CO border.  You can see the plume modeled in these graphics, as presented for 4-5 AM this morning, and then about the same time tomorrow morning (sinking southward). Plume origination points  are easily presented in the Mountains and CA. Some of you should be noticing smoke aloft this morning.

Finally I added a graphic for the W coast as developed by SPC yesterday... for early next week as critical fire danger risk increases with another huge west coast ridge. 

Fire is my concern...and it's plume impacts here in the east. So, i wasn't sure if anyone had seen graphics such as these.  Have a good day. 

 

 

Screen Shot 2020-09-26 at 7.40.13 AM.png

Screen Shot 2020-09-26 at 7.41.16 AM.png

Screen Shot 2020-09-26 at 7.42.52 AM.png

Actually it is from two fires, Cameron Peak Fire in Northern Colorado and Mullins Fire just across into Wyoming. 

Edit: I forgot about the fire near Steamboat...make that 3 fires.

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Nothing much new here... SPC is expanding fire danger in CA next week per strong ridge aloft. You have all your local guidance. HRRRX near surface smoke looks a little difficult for the slopes of the Rockies as per these posts... near surface and vertically deep smoke layer projections. for 06z/Tue the 29th... heading south. Screen_Shot_2020-09-27_at_7_48.47_AM.thumb.png.a75c7bf4c63bdc5b0140ba8e297ad269.png

Screen Shot 2020-09-27 at 7.48.26 AM.png

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Last evening between 6-8 PM was the thickest smoke I've seen here in our 10 years, with a wind shift to the NE bringing down smoke from the Mullen fire (WY) and the trying-to-consume-all-of-Northern-CO Cameron Peak fire. It let up a bit later in the evening and is down to mild here this AM. More of a cold push than anticipated this morning!

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Hello I’ve been away from this forum for a couple months.  As with many folks in the west it’s been a very tough summer - to put it mildly. Where I live west of Fort Collins, we’ve been on high fire alert - first from a smaller fire near Rist Canyon and then Cameron Peak.  We’ve packed up our valuables a couples of times but have not had to evacuate.  I can tell you the rain and snow received earlier in September saved our bacon.  Many others have not been so fortunate.  
 

I consider it a miracle of sorts we got that storm in September.  The day before we literally had our trailer packed ready to leave.  Unfortunately it has now been 3 weeks + without any precipitation.  Not sure what is causing the massive high pressure systems to the west but this seems to be more or less a permanent feature of the weather pattern.  Until or unless there is a change in this pattern, the big fires burning now will keep going despite the fire fighters best efforts.  We need a succession of significant storms to put them out - not just one.  For now at least the weather is cooling down....:thumbsup:

 

 

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3 hours ago, finnster said:

Hello I’ve been away from this forum for a couple months.  As with many folks in the west it’s been a very tough summer - to put it mildly. Where I live west of Fort Collins, we’ve been on high fire alert - first from a smaller fire near Rist Canyon and then Cameron Peak.  We’ve packed up our valuables a couples of times but have not had to evacuate.  I can tell you the rain and snow received earlier in September saved our bacon.  Many others have not been so fortunate.  
 

I consider it a miracle of sorts we got that storm in September.  The day before we literally had our trailer packed ready to leave.  Unfortunately it has now been 3 weeks + without any precipitation.  Not sure what is causing the massive high pressure systems to the west but this seems to be more or less a permanent feature of the weather pattern.  Until or unless there is a change in this pattern, the big fires burning now will keep going despite the fire fighters best efforts.  We need a succession of significant storms to put them out - not just one.  For now at least the weather is cooling down....:thumbsup:

 

 

I feel exactly the same as you do about that storm in September.  It was a freak snowstorm and just at the right time.  I have a trailer full of family photos and such parked in a friends garage in Estes, and it feels like it has been going on forever.  On the bright side, I no longer care much about Covid-19.  :lol:

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The cold shots have been showing here every 45-days (ish) since July, arguably May here, despite a very warm overall pattern since April. That would put the MJO induced repeat of the September snow storm around the week before Halloween. I do think October will be warm overall, but the pattern looks like it will break down. Long-term, I'm not optimistic for snow pack overall, mainly due to the shoulder seasons being warm/dry in general. I don't think the actual winter will be that hot or dry for Colorado, or even northern New Mexico.

The current La Nina is probably the 3rd to 5th strongest to develop since 1980 at this point. It's behind 2010 and 1988, kind of tied with 1999, 2007, and 2011 by the metrics I'd use to estimate strength. A lot of those winters aren't actually that bad: 1988, 2007, 2010, 2011 are all OK to good down here. The weaker La Ninas tend to be hot/wet, or bone dry, with average temperatures. The stronger ones feature very few real storms, but often a lot of moisture starved cold fronts where you can sneak out 0.05" as snow each time, and then enjoy the cold wave for 2-5 days, or even 5-15 days in some cases.

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