It’s the second-to-last Monday in August. We are all ready for the hot weather and smoky skies to be finished. But we’ll be stuck with the warmth and smoke for about one more week.

This is the near-surface smoke map as of Monday morning (August 24th). This map is from our summer service OpenSummit.com. While some of the smoke over Colorado is from our own fires, a lot of it is blowing in from the wildfires in California.

Head over to OpenSummit.com or the OpenSummit apps to play the smoke forecast 18 hours into the future. This forecast helps to show areas that are more/less smoky and to isolate time windows when the air quality might be a bit better.

What you see above is the smoke forecast from a computer model.

What I show below is the smoke in real life.

The Monday morning satellite image clearly shows smoke over almost all of Colorado. Northern Colorado is covered with clouds (bright white) and other areas exhibit the hazy look of smoke. Ugh.

Here’s a view of Aspen. Smoky.

Here’s a view of Summit County. Smoky.

This week’s weather will continue to be warmer than average with smoke filling the skies. There is a chance for midday and afternoon rain showers each day this week, and let’s hope that these showers are productive and wet the ground rather than only causing lightning strikes and gusty winds (which make it difficult to fight the current fires).

Here is a look at the temperature forecast through Sunday. Generally, it’s going to stay warm, though there will be a little bit of cooler air over the northern and eastern parts of Colorado on Friday.

Relief is in sight!

A storm from Canada will drag cooler air over the Northern Rockies and much of Colorado starting around Sunday or Monday, August 30-31.

The map below shows the temperature forecast versus average. Note that next week's temperatures will be closer to the average for this time of year, and that will represent a 5-10°F drop in temperatures from what we’ll see this week.

Also…wait for it…the air could be cold enough for snow to fall over the far northern Colorado mountains near the divide. The storm moving in from Canada will be on the drier side, so there won’t be much precipitation but at least there could be a dusting of flakes along the divide around next Monday.

It’s been a stressful five months with COVID-19, a strong push for social justice, economic pressure resulting in the closing of some businesses, the uncertainty around ski area operations, and lately, wildfires and smoky skies. The colder air and potential flakes early next week will not solve these issues, but it will be a brief distraction that should put a smile on all of our faces as it will be the first signal that the seasons are changing.

Thanks for reading!

JOEL GRATZ

Geography Key

Northern Mountains
Steamboat, Granby, Beaver Creek, Vail, Ski Cooper, Copper, Breckenridge, Keystone, Loveland, Arapahoe Basin, Winter Park, Berthoud Pass, Eldora, Rocky Mountain National Park, Cameron Pass

Along the Divide
Loveland, Arapahoe Basin, Winter Park, Berthoud Pass

East of the Divide
Eldora, Echo, Rocky Mountain National Park, Cameron Pass

Central Mountains
Aspen, Sunlight, Monarch, Crested Butte, Irwin, Powderhorn

Southern Mountains
Telluride, Silverton – north side of the southern mountains | Purgatory, Wolf Creek – south side of the southern mountains