The risk for new wildfires in the western U.S. is rising as windy, dry heat takes over.
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00:00Let's check on what's going on in the West right now.
00:03A lot of wild weather that is for sure.
00:06We're still tracking that fire threat here as we head throughout the weekend.
00:10This is going to go through Saturday,
00:12so we still have a ways to go where we have that elevated fire risk,
00:16and that does include the Northern Rockies,
00:18Boise included, Idaho Falls,
00:20down through Salt Lake City,
00:22and even through parts of central Utah as well,
00:25with that persistent and hot and dry air not letting up.
00:29That just creates those conditions that we need,
00:32and it's not going to take much to spark a fire,
00:34especially with it being so dry and also pretty windy.
00:39Now, let's check on the park fire really quickly here.
00:41It did start back in July on the 24th,
00:45and it has grown to 429,400 plus acres burned and containment is still at 55 percent.
00:56Now, the cause for the park fire was human.
00:59Wildfire smoke still going to be a concern if you look northward,
01:05especially across the sky here through the middle half of the week.
01:10We are tracking some thicker bouts of smoke,
01:13especially there where we have that wildfire risk as well.
01:16That's no good as we head across the Northern Rockies.
01:19Now, further east, we are tracking that threat for
01:21severe weather here Wednesday afternoon through Wednesday night.
01:24Downpours hail, even tracking some localized damaging wind gusts.
01:27The story stays the same as we head into Thursday.
01:30Heads up, some strong thunderstorms from Grand Forks.