After Spell Of No Change Weather In Vermont, Now It's All Over The Place

The weather went from benign, sunny and pretty calm
Monday morning as seen here, but is now changeable,
windy, with a bit of a snow/ice threat by Thursday morning.

I thought the weather was really odd in the second half of October in Vermont. 

We know there's usually a lot of change day to day, but in October, it was one dreary day after another, with temperatures about the same each day. No excitement, no drama.  

I guess a lack of drama is a good thing, but we all crave a bit of spice. And now the Vermont weather has reverted to its usual tricks of switching gears seemingly every minute. 

We have wind, showers, maybe even thunder, snow, sleet, freezing rain, rain and weird temperature trends all in the forecast. 

So we're back to normal. 

TODAY'S CHANGES

As expected, it was a windy night and early morning, mostly in the Champlain Valley and high elevations. 

Temperature trends overnight were also backwards, rising slowly instead of falling like they should. By 7 a.m., temperatures in much of Vermont were near what normal highs should be this time of year. 

But it won't be an extraordinarily warm day. A cold front was on our doorstep as of 8 a.m. It has showers and even some isolated rumbles of thunder along it. Skies were definitely darkening over St. Albans, Vermont as of 7:45 a.m. 

The showers will move through roughly northwest to southeast through the morning and early afternoon, and fading as they head into southern Vermont. Rainfall doesn't look like it will be impressive. But most of the northern half of the state should get a tenth to a quarter inch in a short period of time as the cold front moves through. 

The gusty south winds will turn into gusty west winds, with the strongest gusts near 35 mph in the northern Champlain Valley and along some of the east slopes of the Green Mountains. Temperatures will begin to go backwards again, starting to fall in northern areas by early afternoon instead of rising toward their peak of the day. 

Wednesday is looking a bit wintry.   Snow flurries might dust a few areas early, then most of us northern and central Vermont won't get out of the 30s all day even as skies brighten in the afternoon. North winds will add to the cold. The chilly air will set the stage for an icky Thursday.

THURSDAY SCHMUTZ 

Another storm is expected to zip eastward just to our north Thursday bringing another slug of light precipitation. Though it won't be heavy, but it might still be a bit of a mess. 

It'll arrive just in time for the morning commute. It's hard to say exactly what will be falling out of the sky at any particular time or location, but it won't be pretty. It seems at this point it might start as a burst of snow, then go over the sleet, freezing rain and rain. 

Again, not much, but a little dab will do ya. Plus it's unpredictable where roads might be icy and where they would be just wet. Especially this time of year. Freezing rain might be falling in a particular location, but just melts on the relatively pavement still relatively warm from a mild autumn, But the rain would freeze on bridges and overpasses, and that could surprise unsuspecting drivers.

The Champlain Valley has the lowest chance of snow and ice, but even there, we expect patches of trouble. Away from the valley, as it stands now, you might well be facing a lousy commute to work Thursday morning. It's getting to be that time of year. 

As the day wears on Thursday, things will go to a light, cold non-freezing rain, then taper off.  By the end of the week and weekend, we'll just settle down into a typical  most cloudy, chilly, temporarily quiet weather regime.