BILLINGS- The cloudy skies once again rolled into downtown Billings Thursday afternoon. And while it may be cloudy, it’s still dry.
Temperatures continued to stay into the upper 40s at 2 p.m., and the wind is still out of the northwest at about 13 mph.
In fact, there are a lot of 40 degree readings at 2 p.m. across much of eastern Montana and out west as well. Helena and Dillon have gotten into the low 50s.
But the big story is the winds in the northeast corner the state. There, the winds have been gusting at 33 to 37 mph in the last hour.
This is why we have a Lake Wind Advisory at Fort Peck Reservoir until 7 p.m. for winds gusting to 35 mph.
A little farther to the west, we have a High Wind Watch for the Front Range of the Rockies through Friday afternoon for 65 mile-per-hour winds.
In the Cody foothills and the Absaroka Mountains, the winds could be gusting to 75 mph.
Even the Doppler radar shows the rainfall seems to be moving fairly rapidly towards the southeast corner of the state.
The reason is a new cold front that is pushing into that region and will push all the way down into the central plains states.
In the process, that will cause this stationary front to be drawn backward toward Eastern Montana.
As the front moves east it will take the rain and snow with it.
A warm front will sweep across eastern Montana on Friday afternoon, which will cook our temps up into the upper 50s.
That will then be followed by a cold front on Saturday, cooling our temps down into the upper 40s and low 50s.
BILLINGS FORECAST
TONIGHT: Mostly cloudy with a 50 percent chance for rain showers in the evening and changing to rain and snow mixed overnight. South winds 10 to 20 mph low 37 degrees.
FRIDAY: Cloudy with a 40 percent chance for rain showers. Southwest winds 10 to 20 mph. High 56 degrees.
SATURDAY: Mostly cloudy with a 20 percent chance for rain and snow in the morning and rain in the afternoon. Northwest winds 10 to 20 mph. High 48 degrees.
