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SALT LAKE CITY — Northern Utah residents ditched the heavy coats Sunday and pulled out light jackets or even sweaters as temperatures reached 52 degrees — about 15 degrees higher than what is usual this time of year.
Expect more of the same Monday, with haze continuing to stick around.
National Weather Service meteorologist Mike Conger said a tropical storm coming up from the Baja coast of Mexico will arrive in town Tuesday, leading to widespread rain in the valleys and mountain snow.
Southern Utah, he added, will possibly see a more active storm, with the rain beginning as early as Monday night.
"This is just a good little storm," he said, adding the system is nothing "significant" but it should be strong enough to scrub some of the pollution out of the valleys.
Conger added that the storm will linger into Wednesday and move on. Because it is a tropical storm, it will be a warm event, leading to just rain in most valley locations.
Snow levels will start near 8,000 feet on Tuesday and will fall to 6,000 feet early Wednesday, according to the service.
The higher-than normal temperatures ushering in the storm's arrival are not record breakers either. He said the highest temperatures recorded in the month of January were clocked at 59 degrees.
The Utah Division of Air Quality issued another mandatory air action alert for Sunday and Monday, warning that residents should refrain from using fireplaces or wood stoves and limit driving as much as possible.
The levels of fine particulate or PM2.5 pollution were inching toward unhealthy levels on Sunday and are likely to grow worse on Monday.
Conger said the weather will remain unsettled throughout the rest of the week, with another little pulse of storm coming in Friday, affecting mainly central Utah.
