textproduct: Salt Lake City

KEY MESSAGES

- A cold front is moving through the area tonight with strong northwesterly winds resulting. These winds will be strongest on the leeside of terrain as a result of downsloping. Winds weaken tomorrow.

- Historically warm weather will develop next week as a ridge builds across the west.

DISCUSSION

A cold front is currently pushing through northern Utah with strong westerly winds ahead of the front and even stronger northwesterly winds along and behind the front. Winds have, and will remain, strongest along the ridgelines of the central and northern mountains, the western Uinta basin, and along and west of SR10 in Castle Country. Peak wind gusts across the area have primarily been in the 30s and 40s across valley locations and 60s and some 70s across the terrain and on the downsloping leeside of terrain in the western Uinta basin and Castle Country. Winds across the Wasatch Front have been under performing a bit, so thinking that they will stay at or below advisory levels for most of the remainder of the evening. This front will continue to push into central and southern Utah throughout the night with strong gap winds developing early Sunday morning across lower Washington county with the highest wind gusts approaching 60 mph will be along I-15 near Pintura and portions of the Black Rock Canyon area.

Precipitation has only been spotty snow showers across the highest terrain with QPF totals <0.1". These showers will quickly dissipate after midnight as the front ushers in a drier airmass. Winds will weaken from north to south throughout the night into tomorrow morning, but they will remain elevated across the central mountains through noon before they start to dissipate.

Temperatures on Sunday will be about 10 degrees cooler than normal for this time of year across northern Utah with near normal conditions further south, which is more removed from the coldest air aloft. This will be short-lived as temperatures drastically start to warm next week as a highly anomalous ridge builds across the west. By Wednesday and Thursday a 595 dm ridge will be centered over the desert southwest. This is typically the type of ridging we see in the midst of summer, rather than the middle of March. Our earliest 80 degree on record has a 75% chance of occurring on Thursday which would break the previous record of earliest 80 degree day by 12 days (previous record being March 31st). But there is also a 70% chance that we eclipse 80 on Friday and Saturday with a 25% chance of getting as warm as 85 degrees. This would beat the previous all-time record high for March of 80 degrees. This heat looks to last through much of the weekend before some cooler air starts to move into the region as this ridge starts to flatten with a trough moving into the PNW.

REST OF UTAH AND SOUTHWEST WYOMING

Strong northwesterly winds will continue across the northern half of Utah and UInta County, WY through about 06-08Z. For terminals across eastern and southern Utah, strong, northwesterly winds will continue through the overnight hours and into Sunday morning.

SLC WATCHES/WARNINGS/ADVISORIES

UT...High Wind Warning until 3 AM MDT Sunday for UTZ101-106.

Wind Advisory until midnight MDT tonight for UTZ102>105-107-109- 121.

Wind Advisory until 3 AM MDT Sunday for UTZ110.

High Wind Warning until 6 AM MDT Sunday for UTZ112>114-117-120.

Wind Advisory from midnight tonight to noon MDT Sunday for UTZ123.

Wind Advisory from midnight tonight to 6 AM MDT Sunday for UTZ128-129.

WY...High Wind Warning until midnight MDT tonight for WYZ021.