Thursday, March 28, 2024

Springtime Means Snow Melts Fast In Vermont

 Well, that was quick.

My St. Albans, Vermont yard, late afternoon this
past Monday........
For most areas of Vermont, all that snow we saw this past Saturday is done already. Or at least greatly diminished.  

Here in St. Albans, which only saw six inches of snow Saturday, it was completely gone by early Wednesday afternoon. 

You can find a lingering snowbank here and there where plows shoved the accumulation into piles, but that's it.

Most other places in Vermont had just patches of snow left.  In general, four to 12 inches of snow remained Wednesday in places hardest hit by Saturday's storm. High elevations, where it's colder, are hanging on to more snow. 

I'm impressed by how much the snow compacted and partly melted in spots where the snow was deepest. Both West Windsor and Shrewsbury received more than 30 inches of snow Saturday, but in both towns, the snow depth on the ground Wednesday was just 12 inches, according to data from the National Weather Service in South Burlington. 

The high sun angle of March really helped to erode the snow, too.  Bright sunshine Sunday and Monday really chewed up the snow.  Some of it evaporated into the dry air instead of running off because the humidity was so low.

Some weather stations in Vermont calculated the water equivalent of the snow remaining on the ground. Due to a lack of heavy rains the meltdown has been orderly, with no flooding 

......same exact view less than 48 hours later. That snow
disappeared FAST! 
West Rutland had something like 20 inches of snow Saturday. If you melted it down that day, you'd have something like a little  under two inches of rain. By Wednesday, the remaining snow on the ground there contained just 0.9 inches of water. 

Vermont is having a close miss today that could have led to flooding had the weather pattern shifted just a bit. 

Another in a series of soggy storms is making its way through eastern New England today. 

A flood watch is up today for Rhode Island, the eastern  half of Massachusetts, the southeastern half of New Hampshire and most of Maine due to this heavy rain.

Some of that rain is venturing into mostly southeastern Vermont today, but it won't be heavy enough to cause any real issues there.

Just because the snow is gone, or rapidly disappearing in Vermont right now doesn't mean we're completely done with it. 

Some sort of possibly substantial storm seems like it wants to arrive this coming Tuesday or Wednesday. It's way too soon if that one will be mostly rain, or whether some of us see accumulating snow. 

We'll know more by Sunday.  Just note in all my years in Vermont, I can't recall any April where didn't snow in Vermont. In a few Aprils, like in 1974, 1975, 1983, 2000, even many low elevations had more than a foot of snow. 

Wednesday, March 27, 2024

Quick Weather Weird Update: Odd Vermont/NY Temperature Contrast Continued Today

Weird and big temperature contrasts continued Wednesday
as this National Weather Service map indicates. At 2 pm
Wednesday, it was in the 60s in much of northern
New York, but only in the upper 30s in parts of
Vermonts Connecticut River Valley.
 Yesterday I posted about a weird Vermont temperature contrast that had been expected yesterday with high temperatures only in the 30s in southeastern Vermont to near 60 in the northwest tip of the state.

The actual contrast did develop, but it wasn't as extreme as forecast, because clouds from the east came in later than expected.  

Today made up for it. It goes to show how important sunshine is once spring hits to boost temperatures. 

A tongue of clear skies worked into northern New York late this morning and afternoon. The sunshine briefly appeared in the Champlain Valley, too. So it was another topsy turvy day. 

Under the sunshine, it was in the low to mid 60s in New York's St. Lawrence Valley. In perennial cold spot Saranac Lake, New York, in the Adirondacks, it was 59 degrees.

Here in Vermont, we reached some pleasant low and mid 50s in the central and northern Champlain Valley. But the further south and east you got, the colder dirt got. By the time you were in the lower Connecticut Valley, you were lucky if it was as "warm" as 40s degrees.

This state of affairs will continue - sort of.  Temperatures are forecast to even out. But rain traveling along a slow cold front will drench southeastern Vermont with a half inch to an inch of rain. In the far northwest, it might not rain at all. If it does, it'll probably be less than a tenth of an inch. 

A storm off the coast Friday will make it windy everywhere in Vermont. But as it stands now, it looks like western Vermont will see no precipitation, while a little snow might dust the Connecticut River Valley. That's an uncertain forecast, but something to keep an eye on. 

Eclipse Day Vermont Weather Still Unknown, But Possible Trend Emerging

The path of the eclipse over Vermont on April 8.
Pray hard for clear skies especially between
3:25 and 3:31 p.m. that day. 
April 8 Total Eclipse of the Sun eclipse day in Vermont is fast approaching, as it's only about a week and a half away or so.  

Some of the long range forecasts are now covering that day with supposed hints of what kind of weather will come that day.  Which gets people asking, will we actually see the sky on Eclipse Day, or will everything be hidden by clouds? 

I wouldn't get too excited about those April 8 weather forecasts just yet.   

Weather predictions more than, say, five days out are notoriously unreliable. You might start to pick up trends in the weather pattern 10 or 11 days out, but that doesn't tell you exactly what the weather will be on April 8.

As of today, then, my official Vermont forecast for April 8 is:

"Cloudy, unless it's partly cloudy or clear. Chance of rain, snow, sleet, freezing rain, drizzle, freezing drizzle, sleet, hail, fog, showers, thunderstorms or none or some or all of the above. If the wind blows, it will come out of a direction. Or directions. Highs in the upper 20s to low 80s."

So yeah, not terribly helpful.  It just demonstrates we'll have to wait for better updates much closer to the event. It'll be awhile yet before we see a reliable April 8 forecast. 

FORECAST TRENDS

I did say I'm seeing trends in the long range forecast, take them with a Peterbilt sized grain of salt, but here goes, just for fun.

Most - but not all - of the  computer models have a dip in the jet stream somewhere near the Northeast, which implied unsettled weather and a high risk of clouds. 

What we don't know is whether said clouds will be overhead, or obscure where the sun is in the sky between 3:25 and 3:31 p.m April 8. That's when the total eclipse will be occurring. 

The computer models - to nobody's surprise - have not yet come up with a location of the dip in the jet stream. It could be overhead, or maybe off the coast, or over the Great Lakes. 

This is a random weather map I found on the Internet,
but this would be a best case scenario for 
Eclipse Day, April 8 in Vermont. 

We certainly don't know where any particular weather fronts will be at 3:30 p.m. on April 8. 

 It could be bad timing, with rain and showers going on at the time of the eclipse. Or we could be between weather fronts with mostly clear skies greeting us. 

The best case scenario that we should pray for is that a cold front comes through sometimes on April 7, followed by crisp, dry  high pressure from southern Canada. 

That high should either be overhead, or just a short distance to the north or west of Vermont at eclipse time.  If  that happens, it probably won't be particularly warm, but who cares? All we want is clear skies. Such a scenario would definitely keep clouds to a minimum.

High pressure just to our east would be fine, too, but that scenario gives us the risk of some high, thin clouds. You'd still see the eclipse, but maybe not through perfectly clear skies. 

There are several worst case scenarios. Probably the most depressing would be a nor'easter in or very near New England. Or a strong warm front approaching from our south, which would give us a thick overcast and possibly heavy precipitation. 

The odds are still stacked in favor of clouds. But we knew that already.  On average, there's a 70 percent chance of cloudy or mostly cloudy skies on any April 8 in Vermont.  

Cloudy Vermont seems to always miss out on the best celestial events, as clear skies seem to come only when nothing exciting is going on in the skies. Keep hoping the Weather Gods bless the Green Mountain State just this once. 

Tuesday, March 26, 2024

UN Says 2023 Global Heating Was "Red Alert" But Is the Message Too Doom And Gloom?

"Red Alert."

The UN's World Meteorological Organization called
climate change in 2023 a "red alert" but is dire
messaging the best way to encourage the public
to take action on climate change?
That's the conclusion of the World Meteorological Organization regarding the effects of climate change in 2023. 

The annual WMO Global Climate report is essentially the last word reviewing the crazy weather and climate events of 2023. 

 Records were smashed last year for the amount of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere,  land and water temperatures, and the melting of glaciers and sea ice. 

 "'Earth's issuing a distress call,' U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said. 'The latest State of the Global Climate report shows a planet on the brink. Fossil fuel pollution is sending climate chaos off the charts.'"

 The Associate Press writes:

"WMO said the impacts of heat waves, floods, droughts, wildfires and tropical cyclones, exacerbated by climate change, was felt in lives and livelihoods on every continent in 2023.

'This list of record-smashing events is truly distressing, though not a surprise given the steady drumbeat of extreme events over the past year, said University of Arizona climate scientist Kathy Jacobs, who also wasn't involved in the WMO report.

 'The full cost of climate change accelerated events across sectors and regions has never been calculated in a meaningful way, but the cost to biodiversity and to the quality of future generations is incalculable.'"

Other quick takeaways in the WMO report: 

--- Extreme weather is undermining socio-economic development around the world

--- The cost of climate inaction is higher than the cost of climate action

--- The increasing pace of transitions to renewable energy does provide hope. 

 The United Nations' goal of holding the extent of climate change to within 1.5 degrees Celsius above the pre-industrial average.  It's unclear whether that goal is even attainable. 

The 13 consecutive months through February averaged a bit more than that 1.5 degree threshold.  El Nino worked in concert with climate change to boost global temperatures to that level. 

As La Nina takes hold as expected later this year, the world will probably cool a tiny bit to a level below that 1.5 degrees. So it's not yet a permanent change. But at the pace we're switching to renewables, it looks like we'll blow past UN goal within a couple decades - so much for that idea

GLOOM/DOOM NOT HELPFUL?

The UN World Meteorological Organization report was released with a serious gloom and doom vibe, but was that really a good idea?   

According to Resilience.org, not really. 

"It turns out that critics are right to worry that doom and gloom can demoralize the public into inaction. We found that this strategy had no effect on policy support or climate beliefs. 

And doom and gloom even backfired when it came to more effortful behavior. When faced with the enormous stakes of the climate crisis, personal actions - and perhaps even policy change  - can seem futile. People withdraw or disengage.

Doom and gloom messaging is great for social media clicks, the research shows, but not for motivating people.  

Potential audiences and societies in general are complex, so there's no one way to communicate about climate change and what people can do about it.  Different people responded differently to a variety of climate messages. The response varies country to country. 

Resilience.org continues:  "Sadly, we did not find a silver bullet for spurring climate action. But our research found several messages that moved the needle on climate change beliefs and actions. We suspect that similar lessons apply to other issues, from strengthening democracy to public health. In fact, we were recently part of a similar project designed to reduce affective polarization and found that several messages either didn't work or backfired. " 

However, framing messaging through a moral or ethical lens seems to be the most effective. 

Topsy-Turvy In Vermont: Spring Northwest, Winter Southeast

The National Weather Service office in South Burlington
released this map of forecast highs today and it is 
weird. Highs will be as chilly as 36 in Springfield
in the southeast to as high as 58 in the northwest,
up around St. Albans. 
Usually this time of year, the chilliest early spring air is in northwestern Vermont, which makes sense, as that part of the state is closer to those cold fronts that sneak down from Canada.  

Southeastern Vermont tends to be a little more springlike, with generally clearer skies,  a lower chance of snow or ice and warmer temperatures than most of the rest of the state.

Things are totally backwards now.

Southern Vermont is still deep in snow cover from that mega-snow on Saturday, with more than two feet in many spots.  

Up in northwest Vermont, the four to six inches of snow that fell Saturday is disappearing fast. Bare patches in the snow up there today will rapidly expand.  

Today, the backward trend continues with a huge temperature difference between southeast and northwest.  If you like spring, go to the great not-so-white north. 

If  you're down in places like Brattleboro or Springfield, the best you'll do for afternoon highs today will be the mid and upper 30s, definitely on the cool side for late March. An overcast will add to the chill. 

If you're in places like Alburgh, Swanton or Highgate in the northwestern tip of Vermont, temperatures could get close to 60 degrees this afternoon, with quite a bit of sunshine. Springtime balminess for sure.  

In between those two extremes, there will be a gradient with 50s northwest,  and 40s in central Vermont. 

It gets worse. Southern and eastern Vermont will probably see a little freezing drizzle tonight. I suppose a few raindrops could come down late tonight up in the northern Champlain Valley, but they won't freeze

So yes, it's very strange.  

THE REASON

The snow was already starting to disappear from my
St. Albans, Vermont yard late yesterday afternoon, and
a warm day to day will get rid of much more.
Meanwhile, the deep snow in southeastern Vermont
will stay mostly intact amid much cooler readings. 
The cause of today's weirdness is cold high pressure way up in eastern Quebec and Newfoundland and a storm far off the Mid-Atlantic coast.  That combination is creating a feed of cold, wet low level air heading westward into New England. 

The air is damp enough to yield some fog and drizzle, which will turn to freezing drizzle in many areas east of the Greens tonight as temperatures drop. 

It's even a little worse in neighboring New Hampshire where a winter weather advisory is up for tonight for freezing drizzle.  

This flow of chilly dank air will be hitting a road block in the form of the Green Mountains. This is low level cold air we're dealing with, mostly confined to the lowest few thousand feet of the atmosphere. 

Cold air is more dense than warm air, so it tends to stay low. There's not enough of an east wind to really lift the air up and over the mountains. 

Besides, any cool air that does make it over the crest of the Greens would flow downhill on the west slopes. Air flowing downhill compresses, and that tends to make the air warmer and drier.  If you're west of the Green Mountains you'll probably see a bank of clouds peeking over the ridge tops from the east, but not really coming much further west than that. At least for awhile.

As the east winds persist, some of those clouds from the east will eventually win over later today, slowly blotting out the sun further and further west.  Also, high clouds from a storm well to our west and an approaching, dying cold front will filter the sun as the afternoon wears on up in "tropical" northwest Vermont. 

BEYOND TONIGHT

The cooler weather in southeastern Vermont will at least temporarily slow the snow melt. That snow will refrigerate things, keeping temperatures slightly cooler than they otherwise would be even after this chilly east wind dies out. 

Meanwhile, any sun we get in the coming days will heat the increasingly bare ground, and then the air in the northwest.

Even so, the temperature contrast will diminish. It'll be in the low 50s northwest tomorrow and in the upper 40s to near 50 southeast.

Thursday is a wild card, though. A new storm along the East Coast might create a new northwest to southeast weird contrast in Vermont Thursday and Thursday night. 

 The path of the storm is still really open to question, with various models giving the Green Mountain State anything from absolutely nothing to a total soaker with possible snow. 

There's a chance we could have another situation in which northwestern Vermont is quiet and mild, while the southeast has a cold rain or even wet snow. 

Very unsure on this one, so stay tuned.

By the weekend, things should go back to how it should be: Forecasters expect near normal temperatures, which afternoon highs little cooler in northern Vermont than in the south.

As it should be, for a change.  

Monday, March 25, 2024

This And That: A Vermont Spring Milestone, And Weird Weather Elsewhere

Animal tracks in the snow last evening in my
St. Albans, Vermont yard. Looks like they had been
sculpted by wind and sun during the day. 
 It was cold out there in Vermont this morning, as expected. 

But look at it this way, it'll very likely be a long time before you see weather this cold again.   

Temperatures were in the teens this morning, with some single digits in the cold hollows. It was below zero in some of the cold hollows Sunday morning. 

Unless something incredibly strange happens in April, these are the coldest temperatures you'll see until November or December. 

Don't get your spring mood on just yet. It's hard to do anyway with all the snow on the ground in most of Vermont. 

 Also, it pretty much always snows in late March and April. We probably won't have any more mega-snows, but I pretty much guarantee you'll see snow again before spring really arrives. 

Since the weather is quiet out there in Vermont today, I found some this and that weird things to talk about  elsewhere.

Kansas County Everything

Last evening, portions of a county in northwest Kansas managed to find themselves under a tornado warning, a blizzard warning and a dust storm advisory. The tornado threat arrived ahead of a cold front. Radar images definitely showed rotation in a severe thunderstorm, but it's unclear whether the tornado actually touched down not far from Oakley, Kansas.

The big thunderstorm's strong winds stirred up the dust.  Following the cold front, strong north winds and snow developed the blizzard later at night and this morning. 

The temperature in Oakley went from 69 degree Sunday afternoon to 24 degrees with a wind chill of 6 above early this morning. 

Talk about wait a minute and the weather will change. I don't think I want to live in northwest Kansas. Too much going on. 

Cuban Supercell

Supercell thunderstorms, those persistent, intense, big hail producing, usually rotating and sometimes tornado-producing storms, are a fixture in the United States Plains and Midwest the spring and early summer. They're common in other parts of the world too.

But not Cuba. However, a persistent supercell swept across parts or the island Friday night, surely causing wind and hail damage. However, we have no confirmed reports. Supercells are extremely rare in Cuba but they've happened before.

In 2019, a supercell spawned a tornado in Havana that killed 3 people and left extensive damage. Another strong tornado hit parts of Cuba back in 1940.

Friday night's storms also created rotating thunderstorms that threatened the Florida Keys with a risk of tornadoes, but none are known to have touched down. 

Heat Index Of 144 Degrees?

Rio de Janeiro, Brazil is a hot city. You know, the famed beaches and all?

But recently, a section of Rio had a seemingly impossible 144 degree heat index.   The heat index takes into account both the heat and humidity  to give you a sense of how hot it feels.

A heat index that high is obviously extremely dangerous, and heat waves can cause multiple deaths, but I have no news as to what happened in and around Rio with this torrid weather. 

Much of Brazil, including Rio de Janeiro have had months of record breaking heat due to a combination of El Nino and climate change. 

  

Sunday, March 24, 2024

Last Word On Mega-Snow In Vermont This Weekend: Up to 33 Inches

 I hope you got outside in Vermont today but it was a perfect winter day. 

Final snowfall map from the National Weather 
Service in South Burlington. Click on the map
to make it bigger and easier to read. 
Yes, I know, it's spring, but you take what you can get. Even though temperatures were only in the 30s at best, it felt warm with the high angle March sun.  

For awhile today, in the early afternoon, it was only 33 degrees here in St. Albans, but the winds were light and the sun was strong. I was comfortably outdoors shoveling snow in pants and a black t-shirt. No jacket. 

 Central and southern Vermont spent the day digging out from the deep snow from yesterday. Of three sibling in the Green Mountain State, I'm the only one who had an easy time of it. 

One sister in Shrewsbury came up with a final total of 32 inches - nearly three feet. Another sister in low elevation West Rutland came up with 22 inches. As for me, I had an easy-peasy six inches. 

In Vermont, I counted no fewer than 21 towns that got at least two feet of snow. Most of those were in Windsor County, with Rutland County running a strong second in the snowfall derby.

The highest total was 33.1 inches in West Windsor. 

The clear skies today helped us see a very cool satellite photo. 

Satellite photo today shows lots of snow in Vermont 
and adjacent states, but nothing in most of southern New
England. Bare ground in the St. Lawrence Valley of
southern Quebec and Ontario, too. 
The storm missed those locations. 
Thick snow cover was visible in the satellite photo across most of New York and virtually all of Vermont, New Hampshire and Maine. 

You can see the snow ended in bare ground in Massachusetts a very little bit south of the Vermont and New Hampshire borders. 

You can also see a stripe bare ground in the St. Lawrence Valley of Ontario and Quebec, just northwest of New York State. 

The storm missed that area. Snow is on the ground north of the St. Lawrence Valley. That's mostly this winter's snow that hasn't melted yet. 

FORECAST UPDATE

The fresh snow still looks like we are going to have a bitterly cold Monday morning for this time of year. Temperatures will really start to crash right around sunset. 

The cold hollows of the Northeast Kingdom, and I suspect at least a couple mountain valleys in buried Windsor and Rutland counties could go below zero tonight. The rest of us will stay in the single numbers and teens. 

Warmer air this week will melt a lot of the snow, especially northwest. 

Northwestern areas will be the warmest for at least two reasons. There's less snow there, so the sun will heat the ground a little better. Bare spots will be already opening up in that neck of the woods tomorrow. 

Eastern Vermont and maybe to a lesser extent in Rutland and Bennington counties, should stay somewhat cooler - in the upper 30s to mid 40s Tuesday through Thursday, as a chilly southeast wind from the Atlantic Ocean blows in. 

The Green Mountains will block a lot of that chill, so the Champlain Valley should get to near 50 degrees at least daily Tuesday through Thursday. In what will be the snow-free St. Lawrence Valley in northwest New York, temperatures near 60 are possible. 

We still don't know if an ocean storm late in the week will completely miss our area or bring in a little rain.  So far, little or no rain is in the forecast. As I said this morning, I don't see an immediate threat of flooding from the snowmelt.