We have another little shot of semi-wintry weather coming into the region the next couple of days. For Wednesday, an approaching cold front will kick up some gusty winds in the afternoon across western Nevada, and the mountains could get some light to moderate snow starting early Thursday morning. Western Nevada will be mostly shadowed out from the precipitation, but a slight chance of rain turning to snow is in the forecast for Thursday. As we head into the weekend, a ridge of high pressure rebuilds into the region, bringing back sunshine and temperatures in the upper-60s to mid-70s by Sunday.

So why are nosebleeds more common during the winter than the summer? The air in the winter months is generally much drier than during the summer. Colder air typically doesn’t contain as much water vapor as warm air. The dew point can never be greater than the temperature, and if the temperatures are lower, so are the dewpoints. When you take air that is cold and dry (outside) and heat it up (inside) then the relative humidity gets even lower. That very dry air is irritating to the nasal passages, and I am pretty sure that is the reason for the nosebleeds.