Published Aug 12, 2026 6:33 am
The National Weather Service has issued a Fire Weather Watch for the Sierra Nevada above 3,000 feet, from this evening through Thursday evening.
This includes the Sierra Nevada of Tuolumne and Calaveras Counties as well as all of Alpine County
Thunderstorms and strong outflow winds are forecast. Specifically, there could be isolated to scattered coverage of a mix of both wet and dry thunderstorms. Lightning strikes may also occur outside of the main precipitation cores.
Gusty and erratic outflow winds are expected and may occur near any thunderstorm development.
Lightning can create new fire starts and may combine with strong outflow winds to cause a fire to rapidly grow in both size and intensity.
A Fire Weather Watch means that critical fire weather conditions are forecast to occur. Listen to AM 1450 and FM 102.7 KVML for later forecasts and possible Red Flag Warnings. You are also encouraged to continue to monitor mymotherlode.com
Written by Mark Truppner.
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