Coast To Coast Storm Still Causing Havoc; How It Plays Out In Vermont Still Iffy

Will it look like this in Vermont Friday
and Saturday or will it look tamer?
Still a lot of questions on the 
potential nor'easter

UPDATE 5 PM TUESDAY

Just a few updates for the upcoming storm, with a more comprehensive update coming Wednesday morning.

The National Weather Service office in Albany, New York has issued a winter storm watch for the two southernmost counties of Vermont and parts of the southern Adirondacks from Thursday night through Saturday morning.

The watch says that around 7 inches of snow is possible (but not definite!) during that time. 

Further north, the National Weather Service in South Burlington has not issued any watches or advisories for the possible upcoming storm.

That's a wise decision, in my opinion.  It does look more likely that far southern Vermont could see some fairly heavy snow out of this. The uncertainty is much greater further north, so the NWS in South Burlington decided to wait and look at further forecast updates and data.

We still don't know how far the initial thump of snow will make it to the north on Friday morning, if it develops at all. Temperatures are marginal, too.   

Computer models late this afternoon were still disagreeing if the main nor'easter would veer too far of the coast to give us a good thump of snow, or whether it would come closer, giving us at least a shot of a decent accumulation.

Whatever snow falls looks like it will be fairly wet and heavy, so power outages could be a problem if it snows hard anywhere. We'll have to keep an eye on that. 

Any snow that does fall has a good chance of sticking around to give us a white Christmas. All the long range forecast suggest colder than normal weather between now and after Christmas. 

Meanwhile, rough weather is ongoing late this afternoon in eastern Texas and Louisiana. Several tornadoes have already touched down, doing damage in the Dallas-Fort Worth area and temporarily shutting down the Dallas-Fort Worth airport. 

If anything, the tornadic storms seem to be intensifying somewhat as of 5 p.m. as they get ready to exit eastern Texas and enter Louisiana. So far, there's been reports of five injuries. Again, more on this tomorrow.

PREVIOUS DISCUSSION

 

Amid all the anticipation of a possible winter storm here in New England coming this Friday, the parent system that could trigger that potential storm is today causing lots of issues and dangers in the middle of the nation.  

I'll get into the latest thinking for Vermont in a bit, but it is worth noting how menacing the weather is in parts of the South and the Midwest.

As of early this morning, a line of supercell thunderstorms was approaching the Dallas-Fort Worth metro area. Some of these storms carried tornado warnings, and at least one tornado was confirmed, based on radar images of debris being lifted in the air not far from Weatherford, Texas.

A tornado already caused damage in Wayne, Oklahoma last night. The tornado threat will only increase during the day as the system moves into eastern Texas and Louisiana. 

Further north, parts of eastern South Dakota, southwestern Minnesota and northwestern Iowa are dealing with a gusty, nasty ice storm this morning. Roads are closed and people are worried about power outages.

Meanwhile, a big area comprising western and central South Dakota, western Nebraska and parts of eastern Wyoming are in the throes of a blizzard today. 

I'm describing all this bad weather far off to our west to illustrate that the energy headed our way has the potential to spin up a pretty good storm for us. Of course the question remains: Will it actually happen?

And if anything happens, exactly what?

The answers aren't much clearer on this than they were yesterday, but we're trying. 

Everyone's pretty sure a new storm will spin off from the parent one over the Midwest. The new storm will gather strength over the Mid-Atlantic States Thursday night and head toward the northeast.

Will it hug the coast or go further offshore once it's near New England?  There's still a fair amount of disagreement on that.

As the National Weather Service office in South Burlington describes it, the American computer models take the bulk of the storm offshore. That would cheat us out of the heavier precipitation, and we'd get a fairly long period of light snow. There's be accumulation, but it wouldn't be anything huge.

The European and other models take the storm right along the coast in New England. That would put Vermont in a sweeter spot for a decent thump of snow. The storm would be moving right along, so the heavier stuff wouldn't last long, but at least we'd get several hours of dumping, followed by a day or two of light snow and flurries, which would be icing on the cake, so to speak. 

Another question, still not resolved from yesterday, is how much warm air sneaks in? If the storm comes right up the coast, the initial thump of precipitation would probably be snow. That would come along Friday morning. But it's possible things could go over to light rain during the day Friday, especially in the valleys. 

Afterwards, for Friday night and Saturday, any rain or mix would go back to snow. It's hard to say how much snow would hit Friday night and Saturday. Could be little or nothing, could be a few inches. Stay tuned. 

For planning purposes, I'd start thinking about a potential iffy commute Friday morning. And I'd expect some inclement weather from Friday afternoon into Sunday. 

In the meantime,  you'll see meteorologists make some changes to the scenarios I just described. More data will come in, and that will help meteorologists refine forecasts over the next couple of days. 

These kinds of storms always bring some sort of surprise. Expect the unexpected with this one. 

Before we even get there, we have to deal with a couple minor issues. 

For one, it's cold out this morning. Nothing extreme for December, but almost all of us were in the single digits as dawn broke. A fewer colder hollows hit or got a little below zero. It was the coldest morning so far this winter, but of course even colder weather will come later this winter. 

A strong storm off the coast of Nova Scotia will throw a weather disturbance back toward New England tonight. Northern Vermont stands to receive some scattered but pretty good snow showers during the first half of tonight. Some places could pick up an inch or two.

A cold gusty day follows tomorrow, followed by a warmer, calmer Thursday before the iffy nor'easter arrives Friday.