Full on Fall

Another relatively warm and calm November morning. The clouds from yesterday rolled out of the state late last night, giving way to clear skies this morning. Today - 11/13/2025 - will see mostly sunny conditions with some intermittent high clouds throughout the day. Temps will once again be warm nearing near 70F for the Salt Lake Valley. 

KSLC observed temperature and precipitation compared to climate normals (credit: SLC NWS)

Warmvember has continued relatively unimpeded since the beginning of the month, with above normal temperatures every day in SLC except for one. The nice sunny and warm days have also meant Salt Lake City has been abnormally dry. Luckily, the record precipitation from October has closed in the gap needed to be close to on-track for the normal year-to-date total precipitation. SLC sits at 12.74" of total precip with normal being 13.36" year-to-date. 

Year-to-Date Summary	Observed	Normal	Record Highest	Record Lowest
Total Precipitation	12.74	13.36	22.46 in 1998	6.89 in 1931

Warm and largely dry weather will continue into the first half of the weekend, but significant pattern changes are forecasted starting the second half of this weekend into next week. Fall may actually start being fall, so get out while you can and enjoy the nice weather...

12Z 11/13/2025 observed 500mb heights and temps

A closed upper-level low/trough currently spins off the west coast of the CONUS. As this low digs south, it will become pinched off from the main polar jet/westerlies, which will direct it inland on a more southerly track across southern California come Friday through Saturday. An additional upper-level trough will slide in behind this low off the Pacific late Saturday, integrating it back into the main westerlies and lifting it SW to NE over Nevada, Arizona, and Utah. 

GOES-18 West 11/13/2025

What does this mean for Utah? 

Like mentioned previously, the warm and mostly dry weather will continue for much of the state through Saturday. As the storm approaches the Utah from the SW, a few spotty light showers are possible Friday afternoon across the Wasatch, but valley areas like SLC will likely stay dry. Winds will become a bit breezy out of the south Friday and Saturday afternoon across areas as the long-wave ridge currently over Utah progresses eastward and a southwesterly flow regime becomes dominant. 

ECMWF 00Z 11/13/2025 four-panel forecast 11/13-11/18/2025: (Top left to bottom right) MSLP/precip and 1000-500 mb thickness; 300 mb gph and winds; ; 500 mb gph, vorticity, and winds; 700 mb gph, RH, temp, and winds

Moisture and energy will mainly filter into the state late Saturday into Sunday, with waves of valley rain and high mountain snow moving SW to NE as the low spins across the state. Northern Utah and the SLV will likely see showers Sunday morning through the afternoon. Not a ton of cold air is associated with this system, with 700 mb temps bottoming out near -3 to -4 C on Sunday across the Wasatch. Snow levels will gradually fall through the day Sunday bottoming out  near ~7500' by Sunday evening. 

ECMWF Ens 00Z 11/13/2025: Total precipitation (in) Alta, UT

There has been quite a bit of uncertainty with precipitation amounts related to this storm - due to the storms track and cut-off-ish nature - so any forecasted precip values should be taken with a grain of salt. However, current ensembles have the 50th percentile total liquid in the Cottonwoods (Alta, UT) through Sunday evening at around 0.5-0.6", which equates to about 4-6" of snow. I think the more interesting weather comes in the week ahead, but there is considerable uncertainty related to this. 

Sunday is only the prelude into a more extended period of unsettled weather going through next workweek. Warmvember will be coming to an abrupt end after Sunday, with below normal temperatures replacing the warm conditions Utah has been experiencing. The fine details of events are still uncertain, but in general a more intense and prolonged push of cold air and energy is forecasted to move in on Monday behind the Sunday storm. Additional systems are forecasted to impact Utah through the week as a progressive troughing pattern sets up across the western CONUS. However, there is still quite a bit of uncertainty and spread in the models on how these systems impact the region.  

ECMWF Ens 12Z 11/13/2025:7-day 500mb height (dam) anomaly 11/16-11/23/2025

Considering the much colder temps and more consistent bouts of moisture, the third week of November could be the first real snowpack building event of the season in the Wasatch. We'll see how much total liquid we get through this period, but 50th percentile ensembles are hinting at the best potential being between 2-3" of liquid in the Wasatch with 2-3ft of snow - upper end of that range for the upper Cottonwoods. 

ECMWF Ens 00Z 11/13/2025: Total QPF 50th percentile (in) 11/13-11/23/2025