BOZEMAN – A very weak Alberta Clipper is pushing into North Dakota Wednesday afternoon and a dry cold front is passing through eastern Montana. This brought slightly cooler temperatures to most of Montana east of the divide today but western and SW Montana remains in the hot and dry pattern.
Thursday will be another extremely hot day across the entire state and locally this will likely be one of the hottest days this year. Record to near record highs is expected Thursday for SW Montana with forecast highs in the 90s to low 100s.
A Pacific cold front will begin to enter the Pacific NW Friday and reach Montana by Saturday. Ahead of the front we will see a surge of hot temperatures on Thursday with temperatures beginning to cool slowly on Friday.
Look for increasing surface wind Friday just ahead of the cold front. This will create critical fire weather conditions. Warm to hot temperatures, low humidity, and increasing surface wind will bring erratic fire weather conditions Friday.
Over the weekend temperatures will continue to cool slowly and by early next week forecast highs are likely to fall between 65° to 75°. There could be some scattered showers and thunderstorms this weekend and into early next week.
Lastly, there is a noticeable increase in wildfire smoke today. Wildfires are burning more aggressively with the extreme heat and will likely burn aggressively with increasing wind over the next few days.
