Vermont October: Near Normal Weather; Some Drought Relief

Autumn woods in Richmond, Vermont on Oct. 18.

Vermont was essentially an island of relatively calm in a bizarro word in October, and that includes the way the weather operated during the month. 

As the Green Mountain State managed the Covid pandemic better than other areas of the nation, we also experienced a weather month that lacked the extremes much of the nation dealt with. 

Of course, we can't control the weather, so the atmospheric conditions were just a lucky break. 

Temperatures for October for the month came out near normal.  Burlington was two degrees on the warm side with a mean of 50.1 degrees. Montpelier and St. Johnsbury were less than a degree on the cool side. Morrisville was less than a degree on the mild side. Springfield ended the month at 1.6 degrees milder than normal.

Translation: Nothing exciting there. 

Rainfall in Vermont was similarly benign.  Burlington, with a month total of 3.43 was within a quarter inch of normal. St. Johnsbury, Morrisville and Springfield were all close to normal with rainfall in October. 

The exception was Montpelier, which lucked out and ended up an an and a half on the wet side. They got bulls eyed by some decent showers and thunderstorms mid-month. 

I say Montpelier lucked out because we're still trying to erase a Vermont drought that developed over the spring, summer and early autumn. It takes time and a lot of precipitation to accomplish that.  The near normal rainfall did help some, but didn't fully get rid of the dry conditions. 

Roughly the northeastern third of Vermont is still in moderate drought, according to the U.S. Drought Monitor. Most of the rest of the state is abnormally dry. 

We would want a wet November to set us up for the winter, but the start of the month, at least, doesn't give us much hope for precipitation. Some rain will come later today, but not much.  Also, some accumulating snow will hit much of the state Monday into Tuesday, but it won't be a big dump.

Perhaps some better rains will come mid-month. We will see.

The only temperature extreme we saw in Vermont in October was on Halloween, but even those temperatures were not blow your mind crazy. Montpelier managed a record low of 15 degrees, beating the previous record by one degree.  Still, we've had colder spells that that in Vermont before during October.

One somewhat unusual feature in Vermont during October was thunderstorms. We're usually past thunderstorm season by now, but lightning was reported at least three times during the month. Some of the storms were strong, causing scattered wind damage. That's a bit odd for October

Still, we missed out on a lot of weirdness, which is a good thing We can contrast Vermont's experience with that of the rest of the nation. Unprecedented cold for this time of year hit the Rockies and Plains in the closing week of the month.  That was preceded by record heat in the same areas earlier in the month. 

California dealt with bouts of record heat and another entire month of destructive wildfires. The Gulf Coast suffered serious damage from hurricanes Delta and Zeta during October.

Let's hope we in Vermont keep avoiding the extremes as we march on toward winter.