High Winds, Another Cold Shot And MAYBE A Nor'easter Snowstorm

A snowstorm on Monday?  Some computer models say yes,
but the forecast isn't cast in stone. Changes to this forecast
are inevitable. So it's a maybe at this point. 

 The first of two shots of bitter Arctic air was being flushed out of Vermont early this morning by at times strong southerly winds.  

Such bitter air is dense.  Plus there's still a lot of open water on Lake Champlain. The warm water helps the atmosphere mix, so that is helping pull down strong winds aloft to the surface. Those strong winds from aloft push that dense air out, and the end result is strong winds.

In the northern Champlain Valley, winds were gusting in the 40 to 50 mph range. Colchester Reef reported a gust of 53 mph. The National Weather Service office in South Burlington clocked a gust at 45 mph.  Winds are surely gusting to that level on the Lake Champlain Islands this morning. 

This is all a heads up that there might be some tree damage and scattered power outages this morning in the northern and central Champlain Valley. Although lake levels are fairly low, there could still be some shoreline erosion from waves and chunks of ice smashing ashore. The winds will diminish some this afternoon.

But there's plenty more weather action on the way. 

ARCTIC BLAST #2

The southerly winds have been clearing out the frigid air and temperatures have slowly been rising since at least midnight.  They'll top out in the 20s today, and in the 28 to 35 degree range Thursday. So we're done with the cold, right?

Absolutely wrong.

As advertised in yesterday morning's post, an intense nor'easter will form far off the coast and head northward, brushing Cape Cod perhaps before hitting Nova Scotia and Newfoundland pretty hard Friday night and Saturday. 

We won't get any real precipitation from that.  There might be a light snow Thursday from a separate, weak system, but no biggie. But that big Canadian storm will help pull down Arctic high pressure from Quebec.  That'll bring us a cold snap on par or even a bit worse than the one we just had.  Earlier thinking was this weekend cold spell wouldn't be as bad as the one we just had, but now it looks a little more intense than first though. 

Strong north winds between that big Canadian storm and the incoming high pressure will create increasingly dangerous wind chills as temperatures fall through the day Friday. At night, the breezes will continue as temperatures drop below zero.  I'm sure the National Weather Service will once again hoist wind chill alerts. 

Much like on Tuesday, Saturday's highs won't crack zero in many locations.  Saturday night at this point looks like it'll get into the teens to low 20s below zero, which is colder air than we saw yesterday. 

A DECENT STORM MONDAY?

Early Tuesday morning, indications were another nor'easter that wanted to form would be a swing and a miss, passing way offshore of New England and not affecting us here in Vermont. 

Then, one after another, computer models began to radically shift that storm's potential path westward, and now it appears a decent snowstorm could be in the cards. But we're not sure yet. 

The predictions on this storm will change, but as of now this is how the scenario seems to want to play out, at least according to some forecasts. The storm will come ashore in British Columbia, move on to Montana by Thursday night, then dive rapidly southeastward to near the Gulf of Mexico Saturday.

There it will pick up a bunch of moisture from the Gulf, drop some of that wetness as snow and ice on parts of the South Saturday night into Sunday.  Then the storm will take a turn and race northward either along or off the East Coast.  It would reach New England by Monday.

The devil is in the details.  If the storm passes moves just inland or right along the New England coast, then Vermont has a shot at a midsized snowstorm.  If the storm passes further east, then not much. 

In any event, this won't be Blizzard of the Century because the storm will be moving wicked fast. Even if we get bullseyed by snow, and that is a HUGE if, the storm won't have time to lay down much accumulation. The bottom line is: It might or might snow Monday. Stay tuned for updates. 

At this point, we need any snow we can get to prevent drought conditions from returning this spring. 

After this potential storm goes by, it should stay wintry for most of the rest of the month.