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| Photo taken early this morning clearing off the just under three inches of fluff on what I'm calling Snow Canyon Drive, which is what I'm now calling my St. Albans, Vermont driveway. |
It wasn't much, about an inch or two or even three for some of us, and it was really fluffy. There isn't much water in the snow, and it's like feathers.
My place had 2.8 inches of snow last night, but there was nothing to it. Just added a tiny bit to the height of the snowbanks out there once I cleared the driveway.
If you want to lose some - but certainly not all of the snow - you're in luck, at least in the valleys.
We do have a bit of a thaw coming up for next week. Though there's a chance the thaw could end in a new snowstorm. That possibility is being eyed, more on that toward the end of this post.
I know the ski areas want to keep the snow as long as possible. The thawing won't amount of much of anything up there, and in fact they have chances for a little additional snow during the week.
TODAY/SATURDAY
The chill we've experienced this week isn't really going anywhere today and tonight, but will start to wane Saturday.
A few more snow shower will wander around today, mostly in the mountains, and they won't amount to much. An inch or two maybe in some favored spots in the central and northern Greens. Highs will one be within a few degrees either side of 20 - which is about ten degrees colder than normal for this time of year.
It gets into the single digits either side of zero again tonight.
The warming trend starts Saturday with highs still cool, but warmer than we've seen in over a week - highs in the mid twenties to low 30s.
UNSETTLED WARM WEEK
Next week is going to be a fairly warm one - a rarity in Vermont since the beginning if January. It'll get into the low 30 Sunday, then the forecast calls for highs in the mid and upper 30s with some low 40s here and there Monday through Thursday. .
At this point, the heat wave of sorts is forecast to peak on Tuesday, when some valleys are most likely to reach the low 40s. That's not particularly hot for this time of year. But after what ws turning out to be among the coldest February in recent years, we'll take what we can get.
Nights will be especially warm which will skew the overall temperatures to well above normal. Warmer valleys might not even quite get below freezing Monday and Tuesday nights.
Even with this mild spell, February will still probably turn out chillier than average overall. At this point in the month, February, 2025 is the second coldest since 2008. We'll see where we end up in the rankings when the month ends a week from today.
Precipitation?
The weather will be unsettled through this "heat wave." and, frankly, kind of unpredictable.
There doesn't appear to be any big storms in this mix at least until Thursday night or Friday. But a sort of chaotic weather pattern will bring a series of pretty weak disturbance through. It's hard to hash out when precipitation will fall and in what form next week.
So, taking a cue from meteorologists who know much more than I do, we'll broad brush it and give a nearly constant risk of snow or even rain showers Monday through Thursday.
I say rain showers, because valleys should be warm enough Monday afternoon, and especially Tuesday afternoon to support some cold rain drops instead of snowflakes.
The thawing and bits of rain won't be nearly enough to cause any sort of flooding, so don't worry at all about that.
In fact, I don't think the deep snow cover will melt all that much, as the top layer of snow will melt slightly into lower layers of the snow and then sort of freeze.
The depth of the snow cover will probably drop quite a bit as the minor thawing and light rains will make the snow settle.
The warm-ish temperatures will also perhaps break up some ice dams on roofs and eaves or force snow to slide off some roofs with deep snow on them. Parts of the deeply snow covered roof on my house could stand good slide off right now.
Plus, those tall, tall snowbanks lining my driveway should shrink some. They high banks are making me claustrophobic. And smaller snow banks would give us room to put future snows before winter ends.
Which could happen next Friday.
The computer models have for days been hinting at some sort of storm at that point. If it happens, it won't be nearly as big as the one we had Sunday. Still, some computer forecasting models do have it dumping several inches of snow on us. Others have the storm largely missing, or turning out be be a pretty weak nothing burger. A few don't bring cold air in here that fast, so mixed precipitation would be possible.
The bottom line, of course, is we don't quite know yet what will happen with that storm, if it happens at all. But...
COLD MARCH?
That maybe/maybe not storm on Friday, whichever shape it takes, is almost sure to bring in another batch of frigid winter air. March will come in like a lion this year. Don't know it that lion will be a scary attack animal or a semi-cute little puddy tat.
In any event, the arrival of March will set aside any first tastes of spring fever you might have acquired during the semi- balmy weather we'll have for the last week of February.
It's too soon for specifics, but long range forecasts are leaning toward colder than normal weather on most days through at least the first week of March. There's a good chance the chill could last into mid-March.
On top of that, precipitation chances are sort of leaning on the wetter than normal side, which suggests more snow in March.
That said, long range forecasts start to get especially iffy in March. The northern hemisphere is starting to head toward spring. The atmospheric changes associated with the coming season make predicting how things turn out that much more difficult.
Bottom line: There's no guarantees on how long the late winter chill will last. But I wouldn't start fishing your flip flops and swimwear out of the deep depths of your closets just yet.
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