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| National Weather Service in South Burlington released this wind gust forecast map for Friday. Darker shades of orange depict gusts to at least 45 mph. The little red areas in the mountains depict gusts over 60 mph at an near the summits. |
Don't worry, we won't have those 100+ mph gusts some areas near the Rocky Mountains experienced, but we will have gusts half that strong or even a little more. Just remember, 50 to 55 mph winds don't exactly represent a calamity, but they will cause problems.
As expected, the first area to see the strong winds today is the central and northern Champlain Valley.
So far, we've seen winds gust to 45 mph on the Route 2 Sandbar between Milton and South Hero, and 39 mph in Burlington. Here in St. Albans, I'd estimate top gusts at around 40 mph before sunset, with some stronger gusts as darkness settled in.
The wind advisory in Champlain Valley has been expanded to cover the whole state. It's in effect until 1 p.m. tomorrow. Top winds should be in the 50 to 55 mph range, at least in some spots.
Sheltered areas east might not see much wind, at least until later. That means a few spots in eastern Vermont might fall into the upper 20s this evening before slowly rising. Western Vermont temperature overnight will probably rise through the 40s amid the gusty south winds.
This is enough to create some scattered power outages through tonight into tomorrow morning.
RAIN THEN MORE WIND
Only light rain showers seem to be in the cards between now and around daybreak Friday. Most of the rain will come within two or three hours before and after the storm's strong front comes through.
The whole cold front with this strong storm now looks like it will come in a little later than we thought in this morning's forecast. As it stands now the gush of wind and rain with the front looks like it might the enter the Champlain Valley around 11 a.m. and leaving eastern Vermont around mid-afternoon.
Meteorologists have cut back expected rainfall amounts in the Green Mountain State just a little since this morning. Still a good three quarters of an in most places, plus rapidly melting snow, should cause water to rise rapidly tomorrow.
Minor flooding is still possible, but, fingers crossed, it probably won't be all that serious.
After the cold front goes through, the National Weather Service in South Burlington said they suspect they might have to issue another wind advisory for at least part of Vermont for strong west winds. It will be windy everywhere in Vermont from Friday evening into Satuday. But the strongest winds with gusts to 50 mph along and just east of the Green Mountains. That poses the risk of more power outages.
The cold air behind the front is lagging just a bit. That, and the fact that the front is moving more slowly than first thought, might minimize the amount of ice on the roads for the evening rush hour.
Things will freeze up Friday evening as temperatures go below freezing but by then, most of the precipitation will be over. Expect some snow showers overnight Saturday, with a possible brief burst of heavier snow in some spots late Friday night or really early Saturday morning as a second cold front comes through.
Most places will see an inch or less of snow, but there might be three or four inches in some of the northern Green Mountains. As if anybody will be able to measure it with the wind blowing so hard.
Tomorrow is not the day for winter sports, I'm afraid. On Saturday, the resorts will start grooming back what's left, and enjoying light replacement snow. But I'm betting at least some resorts will have lift holds amid the gusts during the day Saturday.
After this tempest, it doesn't look like there's any big new storms in our immediate future. Just little things coming through once every couple of days through probably through New Year's Eve.
Given the strong jet stream overhead, I imagine we'll have several more days with gusty winds between now and the end of the month, too.
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