{"id":246567,"date":"2026-07-18T11:48:07","date_gmt":"2026-07-18T11:48:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/246567\/"},"modified":"2026-07-18T11:48:07","modified_gmt":"2026-07-18T11:48:07","slug":"pittsburgh-weather-air-quality-improves-as-severe-storms-become-focus-on-saturday","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/246567\/","title":{"rendered":"Pittsburgh Weather: Air quality improves as severe storms become focus on Saturday"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"default__StyledText-sc-tl066j-0 gJuxXh body-paragraph\">PITTSBURGH  \u2014 Air quality will finally improve today as a shift in the winds will push the smoke-filled skies out of the area. While it won\u2019t be perfect for air quality, it will be much more manageable than the last couple of days.<\/p>\n<p class=\"default__StyledText-sc-tl066j-0 gJuxXh body-paragraph\">Severe weather will become the focal point throughout the day Saturday with the potential for widespread damaging winds and isolated tornadoes.<\/p>\n<p class=\"default__StyledText-sc-tl066j-0 gJuxXh body-paragraph\">A few rounds of storms are possible during the day, with the first developing after lunch into the early afternoon. One or two of these storms could be strong, but they will be a precursor for what is to come later in the day.<\/p>\n<p class=\"default__StyledText-sc-tl066j-0 gJuxXh body-paragraph\">A second round should develop by late afternoon and early evening and race through the area before midnight. The main threats include strong, damaging wind gusts with possible power outages.<\/p>\n<p class=\"default__StyledText-sc-tl066j-0 gJuxXh body-paragraph\">The Storm Prediction Center has highlighted areas from Pittsburgh north at risk for \u201cSignificant Impacts\u201d with higher probabilities of strong winds. This is the first time this level of risk has been outlooked by the SPC for our area since the Storm Prediction Center started using this enhanced category in 2014. <\/p>\n<p class=\"default__StyledText-sc-tl066j-0 gJuxXh body-paragraph\">Isolated tornadoes will also be possible, especially north of the I-70 corridor.<\/p>\n<p class=\"default__StyledText-sc-tl066j-0 gJuxXh body-paragraph\">Most of the area will be much quieter by midnight.<\/p>\n<p class=\"default__StyledText-sc-tl066j-0 gJuxXh body-paragraph\">Have a Severe Weather Plan; Check batteries in flashlights; Charge cellphones and download the Severe Weather Team 11 app for the latest alerts, watches and warnings. <\/p>\n<p class=\"default__StyledText-sc-tl066j-0 gJuxXh body-paragraph\">Download the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.wpxi.com\/mobile-apps\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">FREE WPXI News app<\/a> for breaking news alerts.<\/p>\n<p class=\"default__StyledText-sc-tl066j-0 gJuxXh body-paragraph\">Follow Channel 11 News on <a href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/wpxi\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Facebook<\/a> and <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/WPXI\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Twitter<\/a>. | <a href=\"https:\/\/www.wpxi.com\/video\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Watch WPXI NOW<\/a><\/p>\n<p>TOP STORIES FROM CHANNEL 11 NEWS <\/p>\n<p class=\"default__StyledText-sc-tl066j-0 gJuxXh body-paragraph body-copyright\">\u00a92026 Cox Media Group<\/p>\n<p><script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"PITTSBURGH \u2014 Air quality will finally improve today as a shift in the winds will push the smoke-filled&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":246568,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[117,73,75,74,116],"class_list":["post-246567","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-pittsburgh","tag-extended-forecast","tag-pittsburgh","tag-pittsburgh-headlines","tag-pittsburgh-news","tag-wpxi-weather"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/246567","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=246567"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/246567\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/246568"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=246567"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=246567"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=246567"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}