SALT LAKE CITY (ABC4) – Happy St. Patrick’s Day, Utah! No gold, just a little cold for your St. Patrick’s Day throughout Utah!

The bottom line? High Pressure brings sunshine and drier conditions statewide for St. Patrick’s Day!

High pressure keeps building and that means clear skies, sunshine and dry conditions to close out our work week. Flood concerns eased last night in the Southwest corner of the state but wet weather is looming in the long range. 

This latest atmospheric river event not only prompted flood advisories and warnings but also delivered an abundance of rain to our valleys and a decent amount of snow to our mountains. These soggy conditions and active winter weather patterns have benefitted us with an above-average snowpack and a noticeable dent in the drought monitor. The newest data clears all but 1% of extreme drought in the state and shows major gains in the severe drought category.

This week, 39% of the state is battling severe drought, but just two weeks ago, more than half of Utah fell into that category! The latest data does not include the moisture from Tuesday and Wednesday of this week, so we get to look forward to additional progress next week. 

Irish skies will be smiling today, and while there won’t be any gold or rainbows with our weather, we’ll get lucky with abundantly sunny skies as temperatures remain roughly 5-10 degrees below average.

Expect daytime highs in the mid to upper 40s  along the Wasatch Front, a mix of 40s in central Utah, and a few 50s in Southern Utah, with St. George topping out at 59. The ridge of high pressure keeps our weather quiet into the weekend as temperatures warm gradually. We will see increasing clouds into our Saturday, and by Sunday the high pressure starts to move out of the way which will allow moisture to increase.

Wet weather potential remains low through the weekend, however, that will change into next week. A weak disturbance will bring shower potential on Monday with a bigger storm likely to move in between Tuesday and Thursday. The potential of another atmospheric river event exists, so stay tuned as we get closer to next week and the official start of Spring!

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