Wildfire smoke expected to enter valley early Tuesday

Another dose of wildfire smoke is expected to venture into the Las Vegas Valley early Tuesday morning, says the National Weather Service.

Radar projection shows a cloud from Southern California drifting across the Mojave Valley Desert into the valley before breaking up as it flows into Utah and northwest Arizona.

HRRR Smoke forecast predicting the plume moving northeast across the region this evening and overnight. #cawx #azwx #nvwx pic.twitter.com/SxtVetE8n6

— NWS Las Vegas (@NWSVegas) July 30, 2024

“It looks like around 2 a.m., so I don’t expect we’ll see any of it this evening,” weather service meteorologist Barry Pierce said. “Those fires flare up in the afternoon and the smoke sort of depends on how many planes they are using.”

The Nixon Fire in Riverside County is producing most of the smoke expected to foul Las Vegas skies, Pierce said.

“It may come up the (Colorado) River and into Mojave County and Clark County.”

The smoke is not expected to be as bad as the air Saturday morning that sent almost all Las Vegas monitoring stations to unhealthy air quality levels, according to Clark County.

The high Monday in Las Vegas was 106 and about the same is expected Tuesday before highs escalate a few degrees and move closer to 110 by the weekend.

Contact Marvin Clemons at mclemons@reviewjournal.com.