West Hallett Fire started on July 31 from unknown cause.
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Deaths and injuries are direct and indirect together, as the offices filed them. Damage is property and crops in the dollars of the year, not adjusted for inflation, and only where an office estimated it.
The episode as NWS OTX wrote it up.
West Hallett Fire started on July 31 from unknown cause.
The local office's own words before the first event, as it sent them, from the Iowa Environmental Mesonet's archive of National Weather Service text.
NWS Spokane, WA wrote its last area forecast discussion before the first event at Jul 31, 1:26 PM PST, 28 minutes earlier.
Area Forecast Discussion National Weather Service Spokane WA 226 PM PDT Mon Jul 31 2023 .SYNOPSIS... The region will see ongoing warm and dry weather for the majority of the time. Increased chances of thunderstorms expected for the end of the week and weekend. && .DISCUSSION... Tonight through Wednesday night: The Inland Northwest will be under dry southwest flow for the first half of the week. A weak disturbance pushing into western Washington this afternoon will reinforce the cross-Cascade pressure gradient with gap winds increasing later this afternoon into this evening. The Wenatchee Area to the Waterville Plateau is expected to see winds to around 15 mph sustained and gusting to around 25 mph. High pressure to our southeast then looks to amplify a bit more into the Northwest Tuesday into Wednesday. This will deflect energy pushing inland off of the eastern Pacific to our north more into BC. As such, we should see a bit less in the way of winds, but will see the typical evening push of westerly winds through the Cascade gaps. These pushes of westerly winds won't rise to the level of reaching critical thresholds for fire weather concerns, but will be an elevated concern due to the increased dryness across the region. Smoke and haze has been extended through the week across the northwest portion of the region due to the active Eagle Bluff Fire that is burning near Oroville. Expect smoky skies through the week with pushes of smoke up and down the Okanogan Valley concurrent with the diurnal cycles of wind through the valley: up valley during the afternoon (toward Canada) and down valley at night into the morning (toward the Waterville Plateau). A westerly component to the wind further up in the atmosphere will tend to push some smoke to the east as well where skies will look smoky at times around Republic and possibly to Colville. If smoke pushes far enough south across the Waterville Plateau, then we will see the potential for this smoke to drift across the Upper Columbia Basin as well. Temperatures will see a slight warming trend into Wednesday with highs back up into the 90s and slightly warmer then normal for the start of August. /SVH Long term through 12z Monday: Thursday and Friday: Ensembles show a trough moving over Southern Oregon with a small area of rotation over Southeastern WA and the Southern ID Panhandle on Thursday night. This will provide some forcing for elevated storms on Friday as the trough gets closer to the area, though there is little moisture for the storms to work with, as PWAT anomalies show 40-60% of normal moisture. The chance for storms to form is between 10-20% over the higher terrain of Northern WA and The ID Panhandle. The storms over Northern WA will be much drier which could pose a dry lightning threat, while the storms over the ID Panhandle will be able to produce some precipitation, though QPF amounts are only trace to a few hundredths of an inch. Saturday, some models are indicating a plume of monsoonal moisture from the Desert Southwest (PWATs 140-170% of normal) reaching into our area that could lead to some elevated instability and a few thunderstorms. The NBM is showing a drier atmosphere, though deterministic guidance is steady in PoP chances, so I’ve raised precipitation chances slightly over the higher terrain to match. These storms will be more capable of producing measurable precipitation (at least 0.01" of precip), though amounts should still stay near or below five hundredths of an inch. Sunday will be similar to Saturday in terms of moisture, but storm coverage will be slightly less as the trough shifts to our east and we lose the added forcing. Next week will feature another warming trend, though the degree of heating is not well resolved in the models and will need to be monitored in the coming days. /Sinowitz && .AVIATION... 18Z TAFs: A dry atmosphere will yield to VFR conditions at the TAF sites across the region. Light haze will remain from smoke aloft. Smoke from local wildfires will be found in the Okanogan Valley and the Clearwater Valley but should not drop TAFs into MVFR. Winds will pick up slightly during the afternoon hours and evening hours, but will generally remain light. /rfox && .PRELIMINARY POINT TEMPS/POPS... Spokane 53 91 56 92 57 90 / 0 0 0 0 0 0 Coeur d'Alene 52 91 52 92 53 91 / 0 0 0 0 0 0 Pullman 47 89 54 88 54 86 / 0 0 0 0 0 0 Lewiston 61 99 62 97 64 96 / 0 0 0 0 0 0 Colville 44 90 52 93 50 92 / 0 0 0 0 0 0 Sandpoint 46 87 47 90 48 88 / 0 0 0 0 0 0 Kellogg 59 88 55 90 54 87 / 0 0 0 0 0 10 Moses Lake 52 92 54 93 56 92 / 0 0 0 0 0 0 Wenatchee 59 91 60 92 63 93 / 0 0 0 0 0 0 Omak 56 93 57 94 59 95 / 0 0 0 0 0 0 && .OTX WATCHES/WARNINGS/ADVISORIES... ID...None. WA...None. &&
The national radar mosaic for the moment the first event began.
1 wildfire. Local standard time, as filed.
West Hallett started on July 31 from unknown cause. It burned 126 of mix timber and grassland. No structures were loss.
After NWS Directive 10-1605, the rules offices file Storm Data by.
Every storm in Washington in 2023Every state in 2023This day in weather historyWarnings in Washington, July 2023
NOAA National Centers for Environmental Information, Storm Events Database, compiled from the National Weather Service’s monthly Storm Data. Complete through 2026-06; NCEI adds each month about 75 days after it ends and revises past years a few times a year. Rebuilt 2026-09-24. Each event’s entry at NCEI: 1127067.