Monday Evening Update: Vermont Appears To Have Escaped Serious Flood Issues Today

After the first autumn cold front of the season passed
through St. Albans, we see an fall like scene of a fading
perennial garden, hints of color on leaves, and chilly
wet surroundings. 

 The line of torrential showers that passed slowly through Vermont this afternoon was crossing the Connecticut River into New Hampshire shortly before 6 p.m. today. 

The downpours left Vermont with a smattering of flood warnings, but so far, there have been no reports of serious issues.

The saving grace is the line of downpours never stalled. They kept moving eastward, slowly, but steadily. Rainfall rates in some spots were as much as two inches per hour, but the heaviest blasts of rain never lingered long over a particular area.

That prevented major issues. I'm sure we'll see reports from some towns of something like two inches of rain today. But that falls just short of flood weather. 

Flood warnings were issued for parts of the central Champlain Valley, near Springfield, and near Barre, which had to have shook up residents given their history of calamitous floods in recent years. 

There's still time for reports to come in, but it appears that there might have been minor washouts, ponding of water on roads in spots, and small streams and brooks getting loud and rambunctious. 

But unlike Connecticut yesterday, we ended up not having a new disaster. Not even close. 

The warm, humid air that has plagued us for days is gone, replaced by a decidedly autumnal feel. It's still raining in many areas, and that will continue for a few hours yet. But the rain isn't nearly heavy enough to set off any late breaking flooding. 

So, anybody with flooding PTSD in Vermont can relax. 

Typical of a strong autumn cold front (Yes, it's August, but this has all the hallmarks of something that would come through in mid to late September) gusty north winds are funneling down the Champlain Valley. 

If you're silly enough to be on a small boat over on Lake Champlain, it's rough out there. Probably a good idea to head to a marina and wait for nicer days. There's probably some two to four foot waves out there on the open lake this evening.  Gusts have reached as high as 38 mph at the National Weather Service office in South Burlington. 

We can expect more rain showers now into Thursday as a cold upper level low pressure system pretty much parks over us. It won't depart until later Thursday. 

So, we're faced with early October weather Tuesday, Wednesday and a good part of Thursday. That means partly to mostly cloudy skies, scattered showers, and highs only in the 60s, coolest tomorrow.

The clouds and breezes will keep overnight lows "warm" meaning upper 40s to mid 50s. Unlike daytime highs, those lows are only slightly cooler than normal for this time of year. 

It still looks like it will warm up this weekend. But like we've seen much of this month, with a series of upper level disturbances keeping us unsettled, there's hints that another upper level low might take up residence over us starting Sunday.

I'm still not sure that will happen, and to what extent. But if that upper low sets up over us, it will be a much warmer version than the one we'll have this week. Worst case scenario is near normal temperature for late August and scattered showers this coming Sunday through Tuesday. 

At this point, none of those day look like they'll be washouts.