A Red Flag Warning is issued for the Sierra Front Friday morning at 11am through 11pm Friday night because of gusty winds and low relative humidity. The warning includes Washoe, northern Lyon, Churchill, and Pershing county.
The difference between a Fire Weather Watch and Warning is the confidence level and timing. A watch is when the ingredients are there for critical fire danger, but it's not imminent. A warning is when it is happening, confidence is high.
Making tacos is a great example explaining the difference between the two. When you have the ingredients but the tacos are not made yet, it's a watch. When the tacos are ready to eat it's a warning.
Even after receiving over a half inch of rain at the Reno airport last week, our fuels are now critical and dry enough to burn in southern Washoe County. Northern Washoe County is approaching critical levels as well as much of central Nevada. Eastern Nevada is not critical. Wind and heat also accelerates evaporation and drying. With an area of low pressure moving through the Pacific Northwest on Friday and a ridge to our east, the pressure gradient tightens increasing wind speeds.
Fire danger will be critical for several hours on Friday, and could reach critical levels through the weekend as well, but for a shorter amount of time. We always need to stay fire aware in northern Nevada, especially as fuels dry out. Lightning can also start fires, especially if there is not a lot of rain accompanying the storms. It's oftentimes hard to get the lightning lined up perfectly with the rain cores themselves. The slower the storms are moving, typically the more rain they can produce. A low can help to hurry the storms along, but a ridge lacks significant steering, allowing storms to move slowly. This is what happened last Thursday.
Most of the snow we gathered this year is already gone, with the exception of the higher elevations, like Slide Mountain. Highs will be in the upper 80's and lower 90's over the next seven days. There will be some wind each afternoon, but on Friday the wind will pick up earlier in the day.
