Wrong Way Cold Front Is Here; Weird Temperature Ranges, Uncertain Rainfall Predictions Result

The "wrong way" cold front shows up nicely on
satellite photos today as the northwest to southeast
cloud band. Most of the clouds are north of the
actual front, which has already made its way into
parts of Vermont.

 The back door or wrong way cold front we've talked about for the past few days is in Vermont this morning, and temperatures will be all over the place in the Green Mountain State today. 

Basically, we can expect highs in the mid 60s to mid 80s today, which is quite a range.

Luckily, we can sort of pinpoint who will be warm and who will be relatively cool so that you can make your plans, but this forecast won't be perfect.  The northern Champlain Valley and parts of the Northeast Kingdom will be coolest, with low humidity. Meanwhile low elevations in southern Vermont, like Bennington and Brattleboro, will be warmest. And also on the humid side. 

The trick will be who gets what temperature in the middle? It depends upon when the front moves through. As of 7 a.m., it had already gone through St. Albans, but was just reaching Burlington.

Interestingly, Burlington had an odd, brief warmup before dawn before the cold front arrived. It went from 68 to 77 degrees between 2 and 4 a.m., which is the opposite way temperatures should go in the wee hours of the morning.

Then, once the sun came up, temperatures started falling again, which of course is opposite of how things should go. 

All this means is I'm not super confident in what temperatures will be anywhere in Vermont today. It's a shallow layer of cool air coming in, with a warm layer above it.  The sun is nearing its highest intensity of the year. Will that allow some of the warmer air aloft to mix down?  Probably not much, but enough to make the forecast challenging.  

Parts of central Vermont might see temperatures quickly rise this morning, then settle back this afternoon as the wrong way cold front slowly makes its way southwestward toward Bennington. 

Most of the clouds with this cold front are to its north and east, so we will stay partly sunny today, so no matter what the temperature is, it will be pleasant enough with the sunshine.  Skies might look hazy at times due to wildfire smoke high overhead. Yeah, that's starting again. 

Don't be surprised if some places in the north stay in the low 60s will other pop up into the 70s. It will be that kind of day.

In the warm humid air south, mostly south of Route 4 a couple thunderstorms might pop up this afternoon. One or two of those might be on the strongish side, but most people will escape anything major. 

The lingering front makes Wednesday's forecast tricky, too.

Clusters of showers and thunderstorms will be diving northwest to southeast along or near this stalled wrong way front. The thunderstorms might tend to die out as the hit the cool, stable air over most of Vermont. 

This is where the National Weather Service in South 
Burlington predicts today's "wrong way" cold front
will be at 2 p.m. Warm and humid south of the front,
cool and dry north.

But remember, there's that warm layer just above the shallow chilly air.  That warm air aloft could maintain some thunder, and more importantly some locally heavy downpours early Wednesday and again Wednesday afternoon. 

Most if not all of Vermont will see some rain, but this weather situation makes it almost impossible to tell in advance who gets the heavy downpours and who sees just light rain and sprinkles. 

Some places could see more than an inch of rain out of this.  There's a chance a few spots could see enough rain to cause a few flooding issues.  That's a big maybe but something to watch. All this will be happening under gray skies and cool temperatures. Highs will barely make it 60 north. People in southern valleys will be lucky to see 70.

After Wednesday, we settle back into a period of typical June weather. We'll have a chance of showers almost every day for the next week, but most if not all days won't be washouts. Sunshine will burst out most days, and temperatures will be near normal (highs in the 70s, lows in the 50s most of the time).

MINNESOTA STORM

As expected, Minnesota, and parts of South Dakota were blasted by severe weather. Only a handful of tornadoes have been confirmed so far.  I think as meteorologists pick apart which areas had strong straight line winds and which areas had something else, the confirmed number of tornadoes will go up. 

The lakeside town of Forada, Minnesota, which is very much like the fictional town of Lake Wobegon from the old Prairie Home Companion radio series, was hit hardest, with dozens of homes destroyed or severely damaged. 

Today, we have a threat of severe weather in a band from northern Texas to Michigan.  That moves to western and central New York tomorrow on the warm side of the "wrong way" cold front that's pestering us today.