Vermont: The Weather Week Ahead (Spoiler: A Bit Weird)

Rime ice accumulates on branches amid, cold, low
clouds Saturday. Welcomed sunshine broke out on Sunday
The upcoming week's weather will be "meh" and unsettled

 As I often do at the beginning of the work week in Vermont, I try to tease out what kind of weather we'll have to face as we make our way toward next weekend.   

Before I do that, can I give a shout out to the weather on Sunday. Sure, in the Champlain Valley, we had to wait until afternoon to see any decent sunshine. But what a gorgeous day. 

Temperatures were perfectly seasonal, in the 20s. Many of us, especially in the high terrain, had some snow on the ground, so we could enjoy some winter sports for a change. 

The transition from icky mess this past Friday to at least a semblance of normal snowy January is at the bottom of this post. 

Now on to the upcoming weather, which isn't quite so nice. (But could be worse!)

TODAY

Today's conditions won't be anything close to extreme, but the weather systems driving out there are a bit weird.

As expected, a second storm formed off the coast along the cold front from our previous storm Thursday and Friday.  This one turned into a pretty big nor'easter that's taking a slow, weird path northwestward.

Which means it's flinging moisture westward into New England. Usually things go roughly west to east, so this is backwards. While we were enjoying a gorgeous Sunday in Vermont, coastal New England was dealing with snow, mixed precipitation and wind.

This moisture is pushing further inland into northern New England now. It's awful in eastern Maine, where heavy sleet, freezing rain and some snow is making things miserable.

Winter weather advisories extend through northern New Hampshire but stop at the Vermont border.  That's because the ocean storm's moisture is running into a buzz saw of really dry air. That's courtesy of the same high pressure that gave us that nice Sunday

The result will probably be only light mixed precipitation making it into far eastern Vermont and clouds elsewhere. This wont' be a huge impact, but look for patch slippery roads, bridges, sidewalks etc, east of especially if the surfaces are untreated.

Western Vermont might see a bit of sunshine, especially this morning. 

By the way, this storm is also weird in that its center was over the Gulf Stream off of New Jersey (the moisture feed coming into New England is well to the north of the center.  The storm's center has developed a few characteristics of a subtropical system, with a sort of warm core instead of a cold core typical of non-tropical storms.

While this isn't by any means a tropical or subtropical storm, and very likely won't become one, it is interesting for  this to happen in January.

The reason this is mixed precipitation and not just snow in New England is because, as has been the case all month, there's not enough cold air around to support it. Which leads us to.....

MIDWEEK

Another one of those storms from California is zipping across the country and heading our way.  The good news is this one will be falling apart as it encounters us here in New England. The bad news is whatever we do get will from this will be another mixed bag.

Look for patchy freezing drizzle, light sleet and snow showers later Tuesday into Wednesday. Again, this won't amount to much, but we'll have to deal with the nuisance of potentially slippery spots on roads, hacking a thin layer of ice off our windshields, and just being graceful when trying to walk on a bit of ice on the front steps.

During the afternoons Tuesday through Thursday, temperatures will go to a little above freezing in many valleys in Vermont, so that would melt away some of the ice that will form from this little bugger coming through. 

LATE WEEK

A somewhat more substantial storm is on the agenda for Thursday night and Friday in Vermont. It's several days away, so the details aren't in yet. Some of the broad outlines are there.  It's looking like this, too won't be a blockbuster, as it will be moving along fairly quickly.  So just a mid-sized thing.

The National Weather Service in South Burlington is holding out hope that this late week storm could turn out to contain mostly snow.  There are signs that just enough cold-ish air will drain down from Quebec through a thick enough layer of the atmosphere to produce snow.

That's not a guarantee.  It already looks like there will be some mix in this late week storm, especially in southern Vermont.  This forecast could change either way, so stay tuned.

As you can tell by the above, temperatures will remain above normal in Vermont after this blip of near normal readings over the weekend and today.  But it won't be as warm as the first ten days of the month, so most of the snow in the mountains should stick, and there will probably be minor additions to the snow pack for once. 

VIDEO

Taken Friday in St. Albans, Vermont. A slow, grudging transition from wet snow, sleet and freezing rain to snow. We ultimately received about three inches of accumulation Click on this link to view or on the image below if you see it.