As Expected Heat Records Crashing In NW: New England (Smaller) Heat Wave

Today's national weather map shows an immense area
of extreme heat warnings and heat advisories in the West.
Some heat advisories are also showing up in the Northeast
(orange areas) 

Before we get into what's going on around here in Vermont, I really have to marvel at the heat in the Pacific Northwest.  

That region of the nation hasn't even reached the peak of their heat wave yet - that will come today and tomorrow - but record high temperatures were already crashing down, especially in Oregon, Washington, and British Columbia, Canada.

Portland, Oregon rocketed up to 108 degrees Saturday, reaching an all-time high for any date in that city. The scary thing is that new all time record will likely be broken today, and broken by a wide margin. 

The Weather Channel forecasts a high of 115 degrees in Portland today.  

For perspective,  it will be cooler in 99.8 percent of the world today than in Portland. Only parts of the Sahara Desert, Persian Gulf and a few spots in the Desert Southwest will be hotter. Portland is normally a pretty mild city.  Normal high temperatures there this time of year are in the upper 70s.

Seattle hit 102 degrees Saturday, a new record for the month of June.  The record for the date was broken by a whopping 12 degrees. Where this record was set, normal high temperatures this time of year are only in the low to mid 70s.

A weather balloon launched Saturday didn't hit the freezing point until it reached 18,700 feet, something unheard of for this part of the world. That's 4,300 feet above the summit of Mount Rainier, so I'm sure the snowfields and glaciers are melting rapidly up there. 

In Lytton, British Columbia, the temperature reached 110 degrees Saturday, the hottest reading for anywhere in Canada for the month of June.

The incredible heat wave in the Pacific Northwest will peak today and tomorrow before only slowly waning. 

Heat waves are always dangerous, as hot weather is the world's leading meteorologically cause of deaths.  The Pacific Northwest is not used to such hot weather, and many buildings and homes have no air conditioning.  It could get deadly. 

That's especially true since early morning low temperatures aren't offering much relief, making the heat wear down on people. The low temperature this morning in Seattle was 73 degrees, the warmest overnight low on record for any date. 

As NBC News/Associated Press reports, people have done their best to get ready for the heat wave.

"Stores sold out of portable air conditioners and fans, hospitals canceled outdoor vaccination clinics, baseball teams canceled or moved up weekend games and utilities braced for possible power outages."

As climate change continues on, heat waves are getting hotter, longer lasting and more frequent. This one is an outlier that might not be repeated in the Pacific Northwest anytime soon. But like most other places, strong heat waves have become more likely in that region and will continue to get more likely going forward. 

 VERMONT/NEW ENGLAND UPDATE

We in the Green Mountain State are among the many areas becoming more prone to hot spells.  We've seen that already record spring, summer and autumn heat this year, and every year since 2017. 

A few record highs could be threatened in New England today and tomorrow as we get our own hot spell. At least it's not as extreme as the one in the Pacific Northwest.  But it's bad enough.

Today has already gotten off to a muggy, icky start.  The low temperature in Burlington this morning was 75 degrees, compared to a normal low of 60.  That gives a good head start to the heat today.  We'll probably fall perhaps just two or three degrees short of the record high of 96 degrees for today's date. 

I'd say today's record high of 91 degrees in Montpelier is threatened. Other record will surely fall, especially in southern and eastern New England, which have the right conditions for the hottest temperatures. 

After a very stuffy night, Monday looks pretty brutal, too.  It's possible northern Vermont will be just a couple degrees cooler than today, but still hot. Clouds could keep temperatures in check a bit, and a slightly cooler upper atmosphere might hold temperatures back a degree or two.

However, if anything, southern and eastern Vermont could be even a bit hotter on Monday than today, and more record highs are threatened. Tuesday's temperatures in Vermont will drop a few more degree, though the intense heat will continue in central and southern New England. 

We sure do need the rain, and there are chances coming up.  Saturday, my place in St. Albans was probably the wettest spot in Vermont, which is the good news. The bad news is it only amounted to 0.3 inches, which isn't much. 

Most places in Vermont got either nothing or less than a tenth of an inch. 

Only isolated thunderstorms are possible today. There might be slightly higher coverage of storms Monday, but most of us will stay dry. 

A weather front stretching from Oklahoma to central Quebec has been for the past few days a conveyor belt for flooding rains. 

That boundary should slowly slip south into our area over the course of the week. There won't be flooding rains, and we don't even know yet whether there will be fairly decent rains. But at least the chances of some rain increase Tuesday through Thursday.

That weather front will also gradually decrease our temperatures through the rest of the week. It will stay kind of humid, though.