PLAYA WATCH

Weather

Conditions at the Golden Spike, and what they mean for getting around.

Playa now · dust risk (experimental)

BLUEWING MOUNTAIN, 20 mi S →

5LOW4 mph ESE, gusting 6

49°F

Wind 3 mph, gusting 3 · visibility 7.6 mi

Updated 7:32 AM PT

Open-Meteo

Light & layers

Daylight

Sunset in 10h 23m (6:06 PM)

Dark by 6:34 PM

Now: Cold. Warm jacket, hat, long pants.

  1. 12 PMWarming a little — Around 57°F. You can lose the heavy layer.
  2. 3 PMCold — bundle up — Around 53°F. Warm jacket, hat, long pants.
  3. 5 PMRain chance 46% — A shell in the bag. Wet playa turns to mud that stops bikes.
  4. 6 PMWind picking up — goggles and mask — Gusts to 26 mph. Expect blowing dust on open playa.
  5. 9 PMWind easing — Gusts back under 25 mph.
  6. 9 PMRain chance 45% — A shell in the bag. Wet playa turns to mud that stops bikes.

Sun times computed for the Golden Spike; “dark” is civil dusk, when you need a light. The temperature falls fastest in the hour after sunset.

Getting around today

Gusts to 28 mph are forecast — expect blowing dust, slower riding, and poor visibility on open playa. Goggles and a mask. Rain chance peaks at 55% — wet playa turns to mud that stops bikes entirely.

Travel estimates in the planner are inflated by 50% to account for this — an estimate, not a measurement.

Radar

Loading radar…

The nearest weather radar is at Reno, about 100 miles away. At that distance the beam passes thousands of feet above the playa, so it shows storms aloft but regularly misses light rain and virga — the very thing that turns the ground to mud. A clear radar is not proof of a dry playa. Radar by RainViewer.

Air

US AQI

36

Dust

4μg/m³

PM10

6μg/m³

Modelled, not measured. There is no air sensor at Black Rock City in any public feed — the nearest regulatory monitor is about 85 miles away — so treat this as a forecast of dust, not a reading of it. Your own eyes beat this number. Air quality data by Open-Meteo.com (CC BY 4.0).

No active alerts. Official severe-weather alerts for the playa come from the National Weather Service; nothing in this app detects dust storms.

Next 24 hours

7 AM

49°

3g

35%

8 AM

50°

3g

30%

9 AM

50°

3g

24%

10 AM

52°

4g

29%

11 AM

54°

9g

25%

12 PM

57°

9g

21%

1 PM

56°

18g

24%

2 PM

56°

14g

30%

3 PM

53°

11g

33%

4 PM

53°

12g

30%

5 PM

53°

15g

46%

6 PM

51°

26g

55%

7 PM

49°

28g

50%

8 PM

48°

26g

35%

9 PM

48°

24g

45%

10 PM

47°

21g

49%

11 PM

47°

16g

55%

12 AM

47°

22g

65%

1 AM

47°

21g

67%

2 AM

46°

19g

54%

3 AM

47°

11g

40%

4 AM

47°

8g

24%

5 AM

46°

19g

6 AM

44°

13g

Temperature, peak gust (g) and rain chance. Weather data by Open-Meteo.com (CC BY 4.0); official alerts by NOAA/NWS.