This is an archived article that was published on sltrib.com in 2015, and information in the article may be outdated. It is provided only for personal research purposes and may not be reprinted.
Midweek rain storms should ease pollution-trapping inversions over northern Utah's urban valleys, but air quality still remained stubbornly degraded in tentative projections for Wednesday.
The Utah Division of Air Quality issued mandatory air action advisories for most of the Wasatch Front — Salt Lake, Davis, Weber, Box Elder, Cache and Tooele counties specifically — even as storm clouds built over the region on Tuesday. By afternoon, precipitation was expected to fall, resuming on Wednesday.
If enough rain falls to scrub the atmosphere, that dire forecast could be revised. Nonetheless, DAQ's Tuesday advisories banned all forms of outdoor burning and use of solid-fuel stoves and furnaces. The elderly, very young and those with compromised lung function were urged to avoid extended outdoor activity, commuters were encouraged to choose mass transit over private vehicles, and industrial sites were asked to cut back on emissions by optimizing operations.
The Salt Lake and Tooele valleys expected the rain to begin Tuesday afternoon and continue into the evening, with another round of the wet coming Wednesday. Daytime highs were to range into the upper-40s with overnight lows in the low- to mid-30s.
A modest amount of snow was expected in the northern Utah mountains at elevations above 6,000 feet, the National Weather Service said.
The rain ushered in dawn Tuesday in southern Utah, but the weather in Utah's Dixie was mild, with high temperatures forecast to top 60 degrees. Overnight lows were pegged for the mid- to upper-30s.
The Utah Avalanche Center's risk assessment was "considerable" for all state mountain areas on Tuesday, with the exception of the Uintas, which were "moderate."
For more extensive forecast information, visit the Tribune's weather page at http://www.sltrib.com/weather.
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