Sunshine giving way to showers tonight

Enjoy today’s bright sunshine and warm temperatures: a new Pacific frontal system is bringing clouds and a chance of showers or thunderstorms for later today through Friday. Forecasters are calling for highs of 83 in downtown Spokane, 82 in Spokane Valley, 84 in Post Falls and 85 in Coeur d’Alene under partly sunny skies with increasing clouds. Highs should cool back to the 70s on Wednesday through Friday as a low pressure system moves across British Columbia and drags a moist cold front southward across the region. Overnight lows will be cooler as well, dropping back to the lower and middle 50s. Winds are kicking up ahead or and along the front with gusts up to 25 mph forecast for Spokane. Spokane International Airport recorded a gust of 23 mph out of the southwest this morning. The chance of precipitation is greatest today from the North Cascades eastward along the northern mountains and increases tonight and Wednesday for areas around Spokane and Coeur d’Alene and southward into the Palouse region. Spokane has a 30 percent chance of rain showers tonight and Coeur d’Alene has a 40 percent chance. Thunderstorms are possible starting on Thursday as a cold pool of air in the upper atmosphere follows the moist cold front into Eastern Washington and North Idaho. Warm air moving vertically from the ground could form thunder clouds as it rises into the colder air aloft. Weather should settle down over the weekend with a dry northwesterly flow replacing the low pressure system and bringing sunshine again by Sunday with highs in the 70s. At 7 a.m., temperatures were again mild with 58 at Spokane airport, 62 at Coeur d’Alene, 64 at Sandpoint, 57 in Pullman and 57 in Deer Park.