A smoky haze lent an orange tint to the skies above western Montana Friday morning, but officials say it's not from local fires and it's not affecting air quality.
“I would expect here, through the weekend, we will see a tinge of haze in the sky,” Corby Dickerson of the National Weather Service says.
He says the haze is the result of smoke from fires burning in California and British Columbia, Canada.
Dickerson says it likely won’t get worse. He says it’ll stay that way unless those fires become more active and produce a lot more smoke.
Dickerson says the holiday weekend will bring temperatures running up to 15 degrees above normal. Next week, he says, temperatures are expected to linger in the 90s.
He says thunderstorms are expected to move toward the Butte and Anaconda area this Friday evening, potentially bringing lightning, strong gusty winds and heavy rainfall.