Nation Is Remarkably Windy Today, Including Here In Vermont

Gusty winds and a dusting of snow greeting us in 
St. Albans, Vermont this morning.  It's quite windy
today in vast areas of the nation, including here in Vermont.

For some reason, today is windy in more than half the nation. March winds indeed!  

Wind advisories and high wind warnings are up from The northern and central Rockies, almost the entire Great Plains, the western Great Lakes, New England and New York.

The remarkable thing about this is that none of these areas have actual gigantic storms battering them, like you usually do when there's high winds. 

WHY ITS GUSTY

All this wind is why you keep hearing about March winds.  Even when there's no particularly intense storms, the atmosphere is energetic this time of year.  Large high pressure systems come down from Canada, or drift eastward across the country. 

Meanwhile low pressure areas some of which, like today, don't have much moisture with them also cross the nation. The differences in pressure between these systems creates a lot of the wind.

The strengthening spring sun plays a role, too.  The higher sun angle has gotten more efficient at heating the ground than the weak winter sunlight would have. This warms the air near the surface, and since warm air is lighter than cold air, it rises. 

These updrafts displace colder air up above us.  Remember how I said that the atmosphere is energetic this time of year.  That means it's particularly windy several thousand feet overhead. The displaced colder air has to go somewhere, so it dives down toward the surface, grabbing some of those strong higher elevation winds and bringing them to the surface. You end up with a gusty day like today. 

PLAINS FIRES

In the Great Plains, the winds are dry and the ground is dry from drought.  In many areas, it's too early in the spring for things to green up with any modest rain the area has gotten. 

The result is a remarkably huge zone of high fire danger from Texas to North Dakota and beyond into the southern Canadian prairies.

Already, fast-moving rangeland fires in southern Alberta forced the evacuation of a small town and closed large stretches of highways.  

Lots of wind on the National Weather Service map today.
Brown and brownish orange areas are wind advisories
and high wind warnings. That big read area in the middle
of the country is a Red Flag Warming for wildfires due
in large part to expected high winds today. 

The same situation could easily befall areas of the Plains today. Everyone in those areas are being warned to be careful with any outdoor flames or sparks that can ignite fast moving fires.  

These fires can invade small towns and burn homes and businesses, like they did in Oklahoma in 2018 when two people died and dozens of buildings, including homes, were destroyed. 

NEW ENGLAND WIND

When I got up at 5:30 a.m. to take the dogs out to do their business, the woods behind my St. Albans house were roaring in strong northwest winds. Yes, it was snowing too.

Wind advisories and high wind warnings are up for much of New England. The advisories cover most of Vermont as winds are expected to gust as high as 55 mph today. 

Us Vermonters will see scattered tree damage and power outages today, as this windstorm is a little stronger than many we see when intensifying storms depart into the Canadian Maritimes, as is happening today.  Most of Vermont is under a wind advisory today. 

As the winds increased early this morning the Vermont power outages had already started to ramp up. At 4 p.m., there were practically no outages, but by 6 p.m., that increased to 900, and then to nearly 1,900 by 7:30 a.m. and rising fast, according to VTOutages.org.

The wind, if anything will probably get worse later this morning. Wrap around moisture was causing light snow in parts of Vermont early this morning, including here in St. Albans.

That moisture and snow will depart as the morning goes by, allowing some sun to peek through.  Remember what I said above about the sun's heat causing those updrafts and subsequent gusty downdrafts. 

That'll increase later this morning.  (Though the wind will taper off later this afternoon as the Canadian storm moves further away, diminishing the pressure contrast between that and high pressure moving in).

Northwest winds will gain momentum flowing down the eastern slopes of the Green Mountains, so that's probably where the strongest winds will hit today.  But hang on to your hat everywhere in Vermont today. 

There's more wind in our future this week.

That disturbance helping create the strong winds today across the Plains will move east.  Warm south winds will take over Tuesday and Wednesday, but they won't be nearly as strong as today. 

Then that disturbance will consolidate and grab lots of Atlantic Ocean moisture as a new storm develops in New England. 

This will trigger another round of gusty north winds Thursday and Friday.  We're also looking  at the potential for accumulating snow late Wednesday night and Thursday, especially in the mountains.  Very cold weather with, yes, a lot of wind, is likely Friday before temperatures moderate some over the weekend