"Change Of Seasons" Storm To Dump Thundery Downpours On Vermont

The National Weather Service office in South Burlington
released this map of expected rainfall totals from
tomorrow's storm. As always, actual 
results will vary 

  Now that we're well into September, it's time for the nature of storm systems to start changing from typical summer to ones that are more like winter. 

During this seasonal transition, you get a little of both and that's precisely what's in store for tomorrow here in Vermont. .

That means we can expect some of the widespread rains of an autumn storm, mixed with the gusty thunderstorms of summer. 

In the summer, the storms that support cold and warm fronts are weak. You can certainly get some wild thunderstorms along and ahead of the cold front of course, but you don't have lots of wind and rain over a wide area. In the colder months, you do. 

The thing that's coming at us tomorrow is a stronger storm system that you'd get in the summer,  

This storm has a history of packing a punch.  It caused a lot of flooding in and around Chicago Sunday, and created an incredibly wet scene during the Bears/49'ers NFL game at Soldier Field. It was described as Chicago's worst flood in two years, with up to five inches of rain reported. 

We won't have anything as dramatic as Chicago's Sunday, but it'll still be a noticeable storm. Since the storm has some of the characteristics of a colder season thing, we can expect some fairly widespread rainfall, rather than just hit and miss showers and storms. 

However, the storm's cold front is a bit of a throwback to summer. It's beginning to appear that sometimes during Tuesday afternoon, we could see a line of gusty, torrential thunderstorms, especially in northern Vermont. 

Overloaded storm drains in Chicago
created this huge geyser along a street
on Sunday.  The same storm arrives in
Vermont tomorrow, but it won't be
quite as dramatic as this. 

This won't be any kind of widespread severe weather outbreak by any means. But a tree or two, or a few power lines might come down. And, there could be some street flooding and ponding of water on roads here and there with the heavy downpours.

Overall, current forecasts call for about an inch of needed rain across northern Vermont, and closer to three quarters of an inch south. Of course, totals will vary quite a lot. 

 Some places that really get bullseyed by downpours could get well over an inch of rain.  Given how heavy the storm was in the Midwest, we could see this thing over-perform in a few places in the Green Mountain State.

On the other hand, a  few places could miss out and receive a lot less than forecast. 

Another characteristic of this type of season transition storm is you'll notice a big step down deeper into autumn. 

It'll get much cooler behind the storm, especially after a second cold front blasts through on Wednesday. That second front won't have all that much weather along it, just some showers.

But for the first time this season, it will truly feel like autumn by the time we get to Thursday morning. 

Thursday will be breezy, with afternoon temperatures in the 55 to 65 degree range. That's much cooler than we're used to. We still have a good shot at seeing the first frosts of the season in the colder hollows, especially in the Northeast Kingdom.  Most of us will escape an early season frost, though. 

It will warm up again heading into the weekend, but it won't be as toasty as it has been the past few days. That's just another aspect of our step down into autumn.