Once again smoke moved into our area from the SW with resulting poor air quality.  The advancing cloud of smoke from the Creek Fire, seen by many was the leading edge of a late afternoon zephyr that brought hazardous air quality to our immediate area. PM 10 counts were well over 600 parts per million.  The process is pretty straight forward.  The fire is burning some 18 to 19 miles to our SW.  The diurnal heating of the deserts provides for lower pressure to our east.  with higher pressure to the west, pressure gradient sets up drawing the smoky air into the greater Mammoth Area. Expect a repeat of the same today, so get your outdoor activities done early as the smoke will ride the Mono Zephyr into Mammoth once again, later this afternoon.

3 to 5 day outlook:

The upper high over Nevada will break down over the next few days allowing for an increase of SW flow through the pass. This will provide for both, a stronger Zephyr and one that is likely to begin earlier in the day.  The Breeziest days look to be this Tuesday and especially Thursday next week.  Needless to say, more critical fire weather conditions are expected next week. High temps will be in the low to mid 70s, cooling to the 60s by Thursday or Friday. Night time temps in the 30s and 40s next week.

Sunday PM Update

Thursday-Friday:
The National Weather Service did mention in their fire weather discussion AFD Today about the potential for a widespread critical condition event sometime during the Thursday/Friday timeframe of this week. That it was still early and things could change. The forecaster cited that the overall timing of the gusty southwest winds could change but for the most part it looks to be windy due to more upper-level support rather than just the thermal gradient of a typical zephyr.