Debby Making Florida Landfall This Morning, East Coast Flood Nightmare This Week, Stormy Vermont With A Break

Satellite view of Hurricane Debby this morning just after
making landfall in northwest Florida. 

 Lots to talk about this morning with Hurricane Debby making landfall in Florida, a rough storm day in Vermont Sunday and very likely today as well, an eastern seaboard flood nightmare about to unfold, a break in the weather in Vermont followed by a possible new end of week threat.  

Phew! Like I said, busy. 

HURRICANE DEBBY

Debby was making landfall near Steinhatchie, Florida with a four to seven foot storm surge and sustained winds of 80 mph. So it's quite a blow.  Yes, it's a Category 1 hurricane, but they can still do a lot of damage along the coast. 

Especially since this is occurring just under a year after Category 3 Hurricane Idalia crashed ashore in the same region, maybe just 30 miles or so further up the coast. 

Details on damage so far are sketchy, as you'd imagine. The main trouble with Debby is going to be torrential rains and possibly historic flooding in parts of the Southeast. 

Debby is still expected to slow down to a crawl and linger in or near Georgia and South Carolina through much of this week. Its winds will quickly diminish once its inland today, but it will continue to dump tremendous downpours, as these things do. Debby might briefly head off the coast of Georgia into the Atlantic later this week, which would help sustain its strength. 

As much as six to 12 inches of rain could come down in northern Florida and southeastern Georgia within the next 24 hours. 

Continued torrents tomorrow could dump another half foot or more of rain in parts of Georgia and South Carolina. Parts of South Carolina can expect more than 20 inches of rain.

EAST COAST FLOODING

Areas of flooding, some possibly severe, are definitely possible in various areas of the Eastern Seaboard all week. Much of it depends on what Debby eventually does.  Since it will be meandering around, nobody is quite sure. 

For today, outside the Debby zone, pockets of flooding are possible in sections of Maine, New Hampshire and Vermont (more on that below). 

On Tuesday, the best chances of flooding, again, outside the "Debby zone" would in southern New England and in parts of the Mid-Atlantic states, especially in New Jersey and southeast Pennsylvania. 

 Wednesday and Thursday,  the flooding will focus once again on the "Debby zone" in the Carolinas. By Friday, the forecast is less certain, but flooding is possible (but not definite!)  anywhere in a zone from South Carolina to central New England. 

ROUGH VERMONT SUNDAY

In the humid air on Sunday afternoon and evening, storms left their mark on a few sections of Vermont, as if we didn't have enough damage. 

A thunderstorm looming over Colchester, Vermont 
Sunday, cut the sky in half, blue on the left, dark and
menacing on the right. The storm knocked some
trees down in South Hero, but weakened as
it moved further east into Colchester and Burlington.

It looks like Rutland and surrounding towns, and unfortunately hard hit St. Johnsbury were the main targets. 

Two rounds of severe storms swept Rutland County. Power was out through much of Rutland City, part of a  series of storm-related power failures to cut electricity to as many as 6,000 Vermont homes and businesses last night. 

Serious tree damage was reported in Rutland, Center Rutland, Castleton, Pittsford and Benson. Flooding  inundated some streets in Rutland, including at the busy intersection of Routes 4 and 7. 

Up in the Northeast Kingdom, renewed flash flooding wrecked some of the repairs to roads that were destroyed in last week's calamitous floods. Several roads in East Burke were washed out again, and new flood damage reports came out of St. Johnsbury. 

ROUGH VERMONT MONDAY

It seemed pretty clear and calm - and even a bit cooler than it's been in Vermont this morning. The calm weather is about to change once again. 

The cold front that will sweep the humid air once and for all means business. It's providing a risk of (ugh!!) new local flash floods across northern and central Vermont today. And severe storms across central and southern Vermont. 

Near the Canadian border,  it won't be sunny long enough this morning to destabilize the air much. Showers were already gathering in New York, and will increase by this afternoon as the cold front settles in.  So severe thunderstorms north of Route 2 seem pretty unlikely today. 

The rain could come down hard enough, even up by the Canadian border to set off some local flash floods. Again, not sure where, you can never tell in advance, but beware. 

There's a flash flood risk from Route 2 and points south as well, and that will be mixed with a second day of locally damaging thunderstorms. There could be a couple rounds of severe storms, too, much like what Rutland had to deal with Sunday. 

Everything will be hit and miss. Most of us will not get enough rain to trigger flash floods. It'll be hit and miss. So will the storms. Most places won't have storm damage, but a few will really get nailed by microbursts and strong winds. 

Just stay weather aware and heed any weather warnings you get today. 

VERMONT OUTLOOK

Yes, we will be cool and (mostly) dry Tuesday through Thursday. We'll enjoy the much cooler temperatures and much, much lower humidity. 

As for that risk from Debby's remnants at the end of the week or weekend, we just don't know whether or how it will affect Vermont. Some computer models bring torrential rain to at least parts of Vermont, other models are in the "meh" category. 

We'll just have to wait for updated forecasts on that.