Plenty Of Winter Left, But Worst Might Be Over

Mild weather Monday left this snow barely hanging on to
the roof of my house in St. Albans, Vermont. Mild weather
 today should allow this to slide right off. 

We all know that in Vermont rough winter conditions like subzero cold and large snowstorms often last well into March.   

However, we usually see in February some subtle signs that the worst of it is over, that we might be turning a bit of a corner. 

True to form, we're seeing that now.  We get a bit of a break from the harshness of winter this week. 

For many valley locations, Monday and Tuesday saw temperatures a bit above freezing during the afternoons for a few hours. The same will be true today through Friday.  Part of Saturday will probably sneak above freezing too.

It's not exactly spring, but the relative warmth is a slight break for your fuel bill, and coaxes you outside, especially if the sun comes out.  We're starting to feel the warmth of the sun coming back just a bit now.

The sun won't be out all the time this week. Small little storms will throw handfuls of snow flakes or a few rain drops at us from time to time for the next few days. We'll just take what we can get. 

As always this spell of warmish weather won't last. We'll get slapped in the face soon enough with harsh winter weather. It is February after all. It's not always a user-friendly month.

By Sunday, we'll be back into the regime of nights near or below zero and highs struggling to make it into the teens. That'll last until about Tuesday, but it could be worse. It has been in the past. 

Despite the start of a waning winter, mid-February can really hit hard.  A tie for the lowest temperature on record - minus 30 - was set in Burlington on February 12, 1979.  Many of us remember the epic Valentine's day blizzard in 2007.

Still, by mid-month, normal daily temperatures start to creep upwards. As of today, the sun sets a full hour later than it did in December. My guess is that we've already experienced the  coldest weather of this winter back in January.  I can't at all guarantee this, but I'd say we won't see the lowest temperature in Burlington this winter, minus 14 again at least until next winter. 

To give you a sense of what's coming, quicker than you might think, the normal high temperature in Burlington is 30 degrees. One month from now the normal high is up to 38 degrees. Two months from today, that high should be around is 52 degrees. And just three little months from now, high temperatures should be around 67 degrees.