textproduct: Pendleton

KEY MESSAGES

- An upper level trough will bring continued breezy winds and cooler temperatures today.

- A second trough Friday night or Saturday will bring more breezy conditions and cooler, below normal temperatures.

DISCUSSION

An upper level low will move into British Columbia later today. The trough associated with the low will move by to the north, but a frontal boundary will move across the region. Temperatures will be about 10 degrees cooler today than on Wednesday.

Winds will remain gusty today, similar to Wednesday, possibly even a bit higher. Winds should gust in the 25 to 35 mph range across the Kittitas Valley, Simcoe Highlands, Columbia Gorge, Columbia Basin and FOothills of the Blue Mountains. NBM probabilities of wind gusts >=25 mph in these areas is generally greater than 80 percent. However, wind gust probabilities >=39 mph is less than 30 percent except for a few local pots where it is greater than 50 percent.

The cooler temperatures will also cause a decrease in relative humidities by about 5 to 10 percent on average. As a result fire weather conditions will remain elevated, but not critical today.

Another trough/upper low moves down from the northwest later Friday into Saturday. Much like the system today, this low and trough will bring gusty winds to the Kittitas Valley, Simcoe Highlands, Columbia Basin and Gorge and Foothills of the Blue Mountains. It will also bring cooler temperatures. NBM probabilities of wind gusts >=25 mph are greater than 90 percent in these areas while NBM probabilities of wind gusts >=39 mph are generally <30 percent except for the Kittitas Valley and some local areas in the Columbia Basin.

With the passage of this trough and associated cold front, high temperatures will be in the 70s in most areas, which will be about 10 to 15 degrees below normal. Overnight lows will drop into the 40s across a wide swath of the area by Sunday morning.

Flow will become more southwesterly early next week before another system brings more gusty winds and possibly some mountains showers around Tuesday.

For anyone interested in eclipses, tonight there will be a partial lunar eclipse. It will be about 93% coverage. With sunset being around 740 PM or so, depending on your location, the moon will already be in eclipse when the sun goes down. Peak eclipse will be around 912 PM PDT and the eclipse will end around 1051 PM PDT. The sky looks to be relatively clear, the only concern will be if there is any smoke or haze from nearby wildfires in your vicinity. Hopefully, today's gusty winds keep the smoke away.

AVIATION /18Z TAFS THROUGH 18Z FRIDAY/

VFR conditions will persist through the TAF period with the exception of RDM. RDM is currently IFR but is expected to lift to MVFR after 21Z and remain MVFR through 06Z.

Winds will begin to increase across TAF sites with DLS already seeing gusts to 23 kts. PDT is seeing gusts to 15 but is expected to increase to near 24 kts after 20Z. All other sites are under 12 kts but are expected to increase after 21Z to gusts between 17-24 kts.

Preliminary Point Temps/PoPs

PDT 82 47 82 48 / 0 0 0 0 ALW 85 54 84 54 / 0 0 0 0 PSC 88 52 86 52 / 0 0 0 0 YKM 86 55 85 54 / 0 0 0 0 HRI 85 54 86 54 / 0 0 0 0 ELN 77 48 77 48 / 0 0 0 0 RDM 82 42 83 40 / 0 0 0 0 LGD 88 49 86 47 / 0 0 0 10 GCD 91 52 89 50 / 0 0 0 0 DLS 80 57 83 57 / 0 0 0 0

PDT WATCHES/WARNINGS/ADVISORIES

WA...Air Quality Alert until noon PDT Friday for WAZ026-522-523. OR...Air Quality Alert until noon PDT Friday for ORZ041-505-506- 509>511.