Stevens County Fire District 5

09/02/2026

Winds will increase from the south Wednesday afternoon into the early evening. The strongest winds are expected across the Columbia Basin, Waterville Plateau, and Okanogan Valley. Main impacts will be strong crosswinds on west-east highways, reduced visibility from blowing dust, and chopping lakes. This will also blow around any unsecured lightweight items. Use caution is driving across eastern Washington tomorrow!

08/31/2026

08/29/2026

Heads up, there is a 20-40% chance of thunderstorms today in north central and northeast Washington as a cold front moves through. Already multiple lightning strikes this morning in Okanogan County.

08/26/2026

Dry and breezy conditions will raise the risk for rapid fire spread across the region over the next couple of days.

Wednesday, Aug 26 (Elevated): Central Washington will see south winds shifting to the west of 10-15 mph with gusts up to 25 mph and relative humidity levels between 15-25%.

Thursday, Aug 27 (Elevated to Critical): A Fire Weather Watch is in effect from 12 PM to 8 PM for parts of central Washington. Expect stronger west to southwest winds with gusts up to 35 mph in central WA and up to 25 mph across Eastern Washington and North Idaho.

08/23/2026

Update for tonight. Aug 22nd.

Most of the thunderstorm activity has dwindled for now. Monitoring the area eastern WA and north ID in the yellow box for thunderstorm development tonight starting around 10 PM (20-40% chance). These thunderstorms will be moving fairly quickly northeast and contain little rain. Main hazards will be gusty winds and new fire starts.

08/22/2026

The Storm Prediction Center has placed much of the region in a marginal risk for severe thunderstorms today (Saturday). The main threat of strong, to isolated severe storms will be between 12 PM-9 PM. Potential impacts include isolated wind gusts of 50-60 MPH, frequent lightning, and new fire starts.

08/22/2026

This isn’t something you see from the Severe Prediction Center (SPC) for our area every day. This is the SPC’s fire outlook for Washington state tomorrow, Saturday August 22nd. The brown shading represents the possibility of isolated dry thunderstorms, that risk extends into parts western Washington and encompasses much of Eastern Washington. Then the purple shading represents scattered dry thunderstorm coverage, which means the storms are expected the a bit more widespread. These areas will pose the risk of experiencing new fire starts from lightning. On top of it all, there is also a Critical Fire risk in eastern Washington tomorrow for high winds and low relative humidities. Any new or existing fires will likely spread rapidly tomorrow. Surrounding the critical fire weather risk, is an elevated fire weather risk in Eastern Washington for similar conditions, just not quite as extreme.

All this to say, be very diligent tomorrow. If you see any rising smoke from an area there wasn’t before, don’t be afraid to report it. Help spread the word. 1:44PM 08-21-26
-Benjamin J

08/21/2026

Prepare for Saturday. Eyes wide open.

08/20/2026