Tropical Storm Moisture Will Bring Precipitation to the Northwest During the Driest Time of the Year

 We are now approaching the driest time of the year, and ironically, it is going to rain that day.  Temperatures will cool.

An important contributor will be a weakening tropical cyclone (Elida).   Below is the path of that storm from the National Hurricane Center:

And a recent infrared satellite image shows the moist storm off the northern California coast.

But where will the tropical moisture go?  You guessed it..... we will get a piece of it

Consider the forecast of atmospheric moisture from the European model over the next few days (below).

Moisture surges into our region starting late on Wednesday and hangs around through Sunday.

And this moisture will be associated with precipitation!  Here is the total through Thursday morning. You can see the remnant of tropical cyclone offshore.

And the precipitation won't stop..... take a look at the total rainfall through Wednesday morning, July 29th...the driest day of the year.  

Wow.  Lots in  British Columbia. 

Consider the forecast 24-h precipitation total ending 11 AM July 29th for our regoin.  Pretty wet for this time of the year.

Rain on this day will be personally embarrassing for me.... I had recommended that a couple get married that day if they wanted an outdoor wedding.  

Warming Temperatures.....But Western Washington And Oregon Will Miss Low-Level Smoke

During the next few days, temperatures will surge upwards west of the Cascades into the low 90s, but a significant smoke intrusion is NOT expected in the west.

This is in contrast to highly deceptive (and incorrect)  media reports, such as in the Seattle Times (see below).

In fact, a lot of media outlets are providing such inaccurate information (such as Public Radio Station KUOW:

Currently, surface air quality in the west is excellent (see the proof below). Green dots indicate very clean air.

The most powerful tool for looking at future smoke impacts is the NOAA HRRR smoke model.   

Consider the latest forecast run.   Below is the predicted low-level smoke concentration for 4 AM tomorrow morning.  Minimal smoke over the lowlands.

Ditto for 5 PM tomorrow.

And even less smoke west of the Cascades on Wednesday morning.  If you are living west of the Cascades, you will breathe easily.

There will be a short warm period (two days) with temperatures reaching as high as the low 90s, followed by a cooling to near normal levels for the rest of the month.

This is illustrated by the latest Weather.com forecast for Seattle (below).  The Weather.com forecast is generally far more accurate than the National Weather Service.  

With all the wildfire hype going on in social media and elsewhere, it is important to note that there are no major wildfires over western Washington, in the Cascades, or on the eastern slopes of that barrier.   

You want proof?  Here is the last large fire map by the USDA Forest Service:

The Cascades act as a barrier for the smoke from the easstern Washington fires or the smoke coming in from Canada.   Not easy to move the smoke down to the surface from the east.

Finally, for those worried about wildfire, it appears that there will be significant precipitation over the next week, which is close to the climatologically driest time of the year.  

To show this, below is the latest European Center total precipitation forecast over the next 8 days. 

Impressive for this time of the year.