A Few Vermont Thunderstorms Might Get A Bit Strong This Afternoon, Smoke Might Get In Your Eyes Again By Tomorrow

UPDATE 1 PM

These peonies in my St. Albans, Vermont gardens 
survived the weekend smoke and were getting a nice
drink of water this morning. This patch of peonies
was divided from some my grandmother planted
in West Rutland, Vermont way back in the early 1940s.

Unlike what I said this morning, Ii looks like there is now a chance a few thunderstorms in Vermont today could end up being strong to severe, But if we get anything with strong gusty winds, they will be few and far between.

Most of us will just get perhaps somewhat gusty storms with brief downpours, but nothing extreme.

NOAA's Storm Prediction Center has extended a marginal risk of storms into southern and central Vermont.

I actually think a strong storm could erupt anywhere in Vermont, But again those will be pretty isolated.

A broken line of thunderstorms had formed over central New York and were heading east toward Vermont.

The areas of rain in Vermont were not departing as fast as some forecasts suggested. If that trend continues, we might lose some of the instability that would keep the storms firing. Still a little sunshine in the gap between the rain in Vermont and the storms in New York might be just enough to keep thunderstorms rambunctious once they arrive in the Green Mountain State by mid-afternoon.

Meanwhile, NOAA's Weather Prediction Center is maintaining a marginal risk of flash flooding today in Vermont.

Normally, the quick hitting downpours expected in some areas today would not cause trouble, But the soils are so soggy, especially in southern Vermont, that it takes less of a downpour than usual to create isolated trouble spots with flash flooding. 

PREVIOUS DISCUSSION 

The Vermont winds have shifted, the rains came and the air got cleaner as a result.

For now.  

South winds on Monday and overnight have pushed the smoke back north out of our hair. 

Two batches of showers, one coming through this morning, the other this afternoon, are also helping to freshen up i the air.  

Even better, today's rains look pretty benign.  Nothing scary out of the skies today.

There won't be enough rain for many additional flooding, like we had last Friday in southern Vermont. Though a few thunderstorms could be in the mix this afternoon, at this point it doesn't look like any of those will be severe,

This first batch of rain this morning is the remnants of what was some rough weather in Pennsylvania and western New York on Monday. Flash flooding and wind damage were scattered through that region. a tornado severely damaged some homes in Great Valley, New York, about 50 miles south of Buffalo.

By the time this mess reached Vermont as of 6:30 arm, today, there was no longer even any lightning with this batch of rain.   The worst we'll see out of this is maybe a brief downpour or two over the course of the morning, 

We'll probably see a brief break in the action around noon or early afternoon before a new line of showers and storms begins to enter northwestern Vermont toward  mid-afternoon. This will be with an actual cold front.

If there's an interval of sunshine after the first batch of showers goes through, that could power up the atmosphere enough to make some of the afternoon storms a little bit strong. 

Again, if that happens, it'll be nothing severe. In the worst cases, winds could get a little gusty but not extreme. Downpours would hit, then go away way before they have enough time to flood your friendly local brook or creek. 

This line of showers and storms will continue on into eastern Vermont while weakening somewhat this evening

SMOKY WEDNESDAY?

This will be one those so-called "cold fronts"  you often see in June and July in which the temperatures after they go through is a little warmer than the air ahead of the front. As you'd expect, the opposite is usually true. 

The high sun angle controls temperatures this time of  year much more than it would in the winter. Again, that makes sense.

Clouds today will  hold down temperatures, while sun that comes out behind the front will boost those readings. I guess you can call these weak summer "cold fronts" humidity fronts, since they do reduce humidity levels, but not necessarily the temperatures,

Bottom line, sunshine tomorrow could get us up to near or a little above 80 degrees in a few spots.

But that sunlight -  once again - will be slightly dimmed and its light turned a copper color by that smoke from Canadian forest fires. After all, the wind will be coming from the west and northwest, which would push the smoke in our direction.

It'll be quite a bit more breezy out there tomorrow than it was over the weekend. I'm thinking, or at least hoping, those breezes will mix the air more than that calm weekend air did. If that happens, that would keep at least some of the smoke higher up in the atmosphere, instead of choking us as light winds allows the smoke to settle into our valleys.   

BEYOND WEDNESDAY

It's hard to tell this far in advance how much smoke would be left later in the week. So we'll keep an eye on it. 

We are going to get into a cool spell, with highs by Friday and the weekend only in the 60s to low 70s.  Chilly high pressure in Quebec will be feeding that cool air our way.

There's a chance - just a chance - that the French-Canadian high pressure could be our friend this weekend. A stalled front dividing very humid air to the south and fresher, if sometimes smoky air to the north will set up west to east for several days starting Friday and perhaps last to next Tuesday or so.

Unfortunately, a lot of computer models as of this morning tell us that front would  get close enough to us Saturday to blossom out some rain for the umpteenth weekend in a row, especially in southern Vermont, 

But there is some hope that that high pressure in Canada might have enough oomph to suppress that rain just a little bit to our south. It's too soon to start rejoicing about that, as this drier weekend scenario is iffy as hell.