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Out of the fog Photo by Steve Johnson Holiday travelers should have smooth sailing as they head out of the valley for Christmas. This driver enjoys a spin in the sunshine Wednesday on I-5. Clear skies greet holiday travelers By PETER WONG Road condition reports For road condition information, call the following numbers: Inside Oregon -- 800-977-6368 Outside Oregon -- 503-588-2941 To see photographs of current conditions updated hourly on the Siskiyou summit on Interstate 5 and Highway 140 at Lake of the Woods, visit the Mail Tribune's Web site, www.mailtribune.com The Oregon Department of Transportation's Web site also has road information at: www.odot.state.or.us What a difference 24 hours made. With any luck, Christmas air travelers will be clear of the fog that bedeviled the Medford airport for a couple of days this week. Motorists will encounter patchy fog but no rain, snow or ice. "The weather pattern has changed a lot and allowed the fog to clear out of here," said Mike Stavish, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service in Medford. "In some areas, it's hanging around. What we are waiting for at the airport is a southeast wind that will dry things out. If we get that drier air in here, we're going to warm right up and we probably won't see fog in here in the next few days." The forecast for today through Sunday is good for travelers by air and land. Though patchy fog will occur, days will be mostly clear (temperatures in the upper 40s or lower 50s) and nights will be cold, in the upper teens or lower 20s. A southeast wind is estimated at 10 to 20 mph. Stavish said patchy fog will pose some problems for motorists, "but if you are going in any direction, you should be all right." Relatively good travel weather should not cause motorists to think they can be reckless. Lt. Gregg Hastings said Oregon State Police troopers have been out in force on state highways for nearly a week, starting last weekend. "Each of our offices is planning to increase staffing for the Christmas and New Year's holidays, concentrating on the weekends," he said. The news of improved flying weather was welcomed by airline representatives who have had to cope with passengers inconvenienced by delayed, diverted or canceled flights the past couple of days. Phil Herron, manager of United and United Express operations in Medford, said Wednesday morning flights to Portland, San Francisco and Los Angeles left mostly at capacity. "We probably had a couple of extra seats," he said. "But there is nobody hanging around. We have gotten everybody out. If the weather holds out, we should not have any problems at all, but it is a wait-and-see situation." An official at Horizon Air said its first flight arrived at 11:19 a.m. Wednesday, behind schedule, but a couple of other flight delays were for reasons other than bad weather. Fog collects when an air inversion develops. The lack of wind during an inversion causes cold air to collect on the valley floor. As the air cools, moisture condenses and the fog thickens. To break up the fog Wednesday morning, workers at Rogue Valley International-Medford Airport resorted to seeding the fog and causing it to snow. The process improved the visibility for planes seeking to land at or take off from Medford, but it created slick surfaces on nearby roads, including Crater Lake Highway. Kim Stearns, the airport's marketing representative, said seeding was not done Monday or Tuesday because the inversion layer trapping the fog was not cold enough to allow seeding. A lack of approach lights on the runway, which is being lengthened, requires higher cloud ceilings (200 feet instead of 100) and greater visibility (one mile instead of a half mile) for commuter planes to land. Those turbo-propeller planes are commonly used by Horizon Air and United Express in and out of Medford. Enjoy the mild weather while you can. George Taylor, the state climatologist based at Oregon State University, said he is sticking to a forecast of a wetter-than-usual winter, probably beginning next month. Mail Tribune Copyright � The Mail Tribune 1999, Medford, Oregon USA