National Fire News

Over the next week, areas with elevated fire weather concerns will primarily be focused on parts of the Southwest and South, with southern Arizona/New Mexico and Florida having the highest potential for significant wildfires to arise. A cold front moving through the Plains and into the Southeast over the weekend will bring higher humidity to most areas and widespread wetting rain from central Texas to the southeast Atlantic coast; however, Florida will likely remain hot and dry. Warm and dry conditions will persist in the southern Great Basin, Mojave Desert, and Southwest (west of The Divide) into early next week, with daily relative humidities of 5-20% and overnight recoveries below 50%. Across the Southwest, breezy winds will contribute to the gradual, seasonal increase in fire potential. Elsewhere in the West, normal to below normal temperatures, accompanied by light precipitation, are expected for the Northwest and Northern Rockies over the weekend. Similarly, the Northeast and Mid-Atlantic will see scattered light precipitation through the weekend. A few more days of dry and breezy conditions are expected across the northern Plains and Upper Midwest, although some modest precipitation is possible next week. Mild and dry conditions are forecast for much of Interior Alaska into the weekend, with a gradual cooling trend early next week, while dry and occasionally breezy trade winds are forecast for Hawai’i.