A Brief New Year's Eve Early Eveing Vermont Forecast

Updated National Weather Service snow accumulation
map for tonight and early tomorrow. Most of us get
two or three windblown inches. More than that in
the mountains, a little less in the immediate
Champlain Valley. Roads iffy most of overnight. 

Darkness has fallen as of 5 p.m. as we ride out the last few hours of 2025. 

There's been minor updates to the weather forecast for our celebrations, but the overall prediction remains the same as I outlined this morning. 

As we go through the evening, there will be a rising chance of light snow as what is now a small storm develops over western New York and then drifts over northern Vermont overnight and into the wee hours of tomorrow. 

Southern Vermont, especially Bennington County, is in a position in relation to the storm to have better moisture and dynamics in the atmosphere than other sections of Vermont. 

So in the southwest corner of the state, we've got a winter weather advisory overnight for three to six inches of snow. The higher amounts will fall in the southern Green Mountains. 

Winds will pick up overnight and into the morning. That sets the stage for blowing snow. It'll be a light and fluffy snow, which blows around easily. It'll also be falling on a hard crust of snow, thanks to the freezing rain we had the other day. 

That solid crust means there won't be much friction to keep the new snow in place when the wind blows. We'll end up with more visibility problems and snow drifts than usual from a snowfall this size.

On the roads, it won't be the end of the world as far as their conditions. But it's cold enough so the snow will stick, and conditions will get slick pretty much statewide. Add in the risk of the occasional New Year's Eve drunk driver and it gets a little more dangerous. If you're out partying tonight, drive defensively, slowly and sober tonight, folks!

Aside from the Green Mountain mountain chain and parts of southern Vermont, most of us should still expect two or three inches of snow by the time it mostly stops by the time you're having your Bloody Marys late in the morning tomorrow.  There might only be one to two inches in the immediate Champlain Valley and parts of the lower Connecticut River valley. 

The ski areas should get a decent four to six inches of new snow, with locally higher amounts. Good luck measuring the damn snow, since it will be blowing around so much. 

Which leads us to the other problem. The cold. High temperatures New Year's Day will hit just after midnight tonight, when you're all out there screaming in the New Year. Those temperatures will be in the 20s at midnight, then fall through the teens into the single numbers by tomorrow evening. 

Winds gusting in the 25 to 35 mph range will keep wind chills below zero all day.  It'll stay cold until our next desperate chance of warmup of sort by around next Tuesday. 

Agricultural Yields Already Suffering With Climate Change

We really haven't noticed it yet, but climate change is 
cutting into agricultural yields, and the problem will
keep worsening as the world warms. 

There aren't any big worldwide food shortages, at least not yet, due to climate change, but a new study suggests we are definitely heading in the wrong direction.  

According to Preventionweb.net:

"Global agricultural productivity has declined by about 21 percent in the last 60 years as a result of climate change - the equivalent of seven years' lost production - a study has found. 

The decrease was most pronounced in warm regions such as Africa (30 percent) and Latin America and the Caribbean (26 percent) according to research published in Nature Climate Change, which looked at data from 1961 to 2020."

The seeming disconnect behind what seems to be adequate food supply and lost production is explained this way:

"Ariel Ortiz-Bobea, professor of applied economics at Cornell University and lead author of the study, told SciDev.Net: 'These numbers don't mean that we are producing less than we did back in 1961 - we've actually produced more year after year. Instead, our study is saying that global agricultural productivity is almost 21 percent lower than it could have been in a world without climate change.'"

Improvements in productivity have helped keep up yields, but it's not translating to resilience to climate change. 

There are considerations that the study might not have entirely taken into account. Per Preventionweb.net:

"This research doesn't consider small-scale agriculture which persists in different parts of the world, like Africa and Latin America, probably because this type of production is usually not included in official records," said Carolina Greta-Sanchez of the Center of Atmospheric Sciences at the National Autonomous University of Mexico. 

Other research is similar to the one I described above. 

A June New Scientist article has this to say:

"Rising global temperatures are likely to cause deep losses to the world's most important crops - despite farmers' best efforts to adapt. A global analysis to crop yields suggests that, by the end of the century, each degree Celsius of warming will reduce the food available per person any about 121 kilocalories a day. 

Under a 3 degree Celsius scenario - roughly our current trajectory - 'that works out to giving up breakfast for everyone,' says Andrew Hultgren at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champagne."

The research cited in New Scientist said the six main global staple crops. They found that all crops except rice would suffer in a hotter world. (Rice crops like hotter nights) 

An example of the projected reduced crop yields with climate change is corn. Yields would fall by 12 to 28 percent by the end of the century, depending on whether greenhouse gasses rise moderately or very quickly. 

The number these researchers came up with take into account how farmers would adapt to hotter temperatures, and the fact crops might be fertilized a bit because of higher carbon dioxide levels in the atmosphere.  

A Bit Of Challenging Vermont Weather To Ring Out A Very Challenging 2025

We've got  modest snowfall coming overnight, with one
to three inches in most areas of Vermont. A little more
than that in the mountains. Roads could be a little
slick for New Years revelers late tonight. 

We've had a very challenging 2025, both in terms of weather and especially outside the realm of weather.  

For those of you who don't want to think about anything else that happened in 2025, I'll give you the rundown of the weather you'll see as you ring in 2026. 

Seems harmless, right?   

And for the most part, the weather will indeed be relatively safe. No new ice storms, no floods, no blizzards, not enough wind to snap the power lines. 

You should be fine tonight unless you're not careful on the roads. Or don't know how to dress for winter weather. Because it is going to snow overnight. And Vermont ain't Florida. 

So let's unpack the weather situation here:

Overnight, a small but fairly dynamic storm will move out of the Great Lakes and into northern New York and Vermont. The storm will be able to pick some moisture from the lakes and from those lake affect snow squalls going on out there. 

We had some clear skies in much of Vermont this morning, except in far southwestern parts of the state, as snow off of Lake Ontario is getting all the way to New England.

It'll cloud up pretty fast this afternoon, as temperatures rise into the mid and upper 20s.  You might start to see some light flurries after dark. Occasional light snow will continue all evening leading up to midnight. 

Most of the action will hit in northern New York, where the snow will tend to be heavier and hit hardest around midnight.  

Here in Vermont, it'll probably be snowing in many area as we ring in the New Year.  Not heavily, not all the time, but it'll be around. You'll of course encounter roads that are a bit iffy. Most of the snow in the Green Mountain State will sweep in a little after midnight. 

Most of us won't get much snow, but the timing will be bad, coming right when it'll be the peak drunk driving hours around midnight and a couple hours after. 

Since it will be cold, the snow will blow around easily, so you might have trouble seeing things if a truck passes you on the Interstate. 

If you'll be celebrating outside, dress for it. Temperatures around midnight will be in the teens to around 20. 

The little storm's cold front could stir up some snow squalls or at least pretty heavy snow showers, probably a little after midnight. So take that into consideration if you're driving anywhere after midnight. 

Maybe it'll be best to sleep it off wherever you are overnight instead of getting in your car and driving home.  Or take an Uber, though they'll be hard to come by and super expensive tonight. 

Total accumulation from tonight's little system will amount to one to three inches for most of us.  The valleys of southeast Vermont will probably get less than an inch. The northern Champlain Valley will probably come out close to three inches or maybe even a tad more. Our ski areas are in for a modest three to six inches. 

The New Year will get off to a cold start. Today, the last day of 2025, will probably be the warmest day we'll see in at least a week. As noted, it won't exactly be warm today. Starting tomorrow, daytime highs for most of us in the Green Mountain State won't get out of the teens until next Monday at the earliest. 

Low temperatures each night through next Monday will be within a few degrees either side of zero. If we manage to get a nighttime period of calm, clear weather, it could get well below zero. It's all about that persistent Greenland Block/Arctic Oscillation I explained yesterday. 

It will warm up eventually, of course. Weather patterns always change eventually. Unless we get a surprise I'm not seeing yet, the next chance of any kind of thawing or at least relatively mild air won't come until at least January 11 or so.  

"Rusting Rivers" in Arctic An Ominous Sign Of Climate Change

Rusty water in a waterway in the Arctic. The permafrost
is melting, which releases metals that were once frozen
into place, onto the surface. 

High up in the Arctic, rivers and streams are turning red-orange, as if billions of nails were rusting away and flowing into what should be pristine brooks way up there. 

As NPR reports, these rusty rivers are now widely documented in the Brooks Range in northern Alaska. 

"Hundreds of Arctic rivers and streams are turning bright red-orange, not from chemical pollution, but from naturally occurring iron spilling from long-frozen ground as temperatures warm. 

The "rusting rivers" phenomenon, which has been documented across the Brooks Range in northern Alaska, offer a vivid example of the effects of climate change in a region that is warming faster than the global average."

Other metals, like aluminum and copper are also being release from the thawing permafrost, NPR says. Those metals can do a number on fish and other animals in the food chain. People are also wondering if the metals might contaminate rural drinking supplies, but so far, there's been no evidence of that. 

This information comes from an annual  "Arctic Report Card" that was recently released by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA). They've been doing this for 20 years because the Arctic is the fastest warming place on Earth. And what goes on in the Arctic doesn't stay in the Arctic. 

This annual report is threatened because - big eye roll - the Trump administration does not want any government reports to even hint at climate change. He's terribly allergic to the term, constantly referring to idea of a warming world as a "hoax"

Scientist hope to keep the report card going, maybe by working around the United States.  

As NPR reports:

"An independent network of global scientists writes and compiles the research in the annual report, offering it some shelter from political winds. Some sections of this year's edition openly discuss the effects of climate change, and at least one study notes its major cause - burning fossil fuels."

Let's hope Trump doesn't find out about that line.

It's depressing to realize that basic scientific facts are now much like Soviet-era samizdat, publications that take great risks at offending the Fascist In Chief. We can't be sure if there will be another valuable Arctic Report Card next year 

Other information in the 2025 Arctic Report Card:

-- The Greenland Ice Sheet lost 129 billion tons of ice in 2025, continuing its long term trend. 

-- Alaskan glaciers have lost an average of 125 vertical feet since the 1950s. 

-- Arctic sea ice reached its lowest level on record this fall and early winter. 

-- The period from October 2024 to September, 2025 was the Arctic's warmest and wettest on record. 

-- Because of the increased precipitation in the Arctic, snow cover was above average during the heart of winter.  But the snow cover was well below normal by June, because of the unusual Arctic warmth. 

-- The relative lack of ice and snow allows the sun to heat the ground and water in the Arctic more than it would otherwise. That makes existing left over snow and ice melt even faster. It's called a feedback loop.    

As I've said before, what goes on in the Arctic doesn't stay in the Arctic. As much as climate change is messing up the top of the world, its effects will bleed down to the mid-latitudes through higher sea levels on the coasts, and bigger, more destructive storms. 

Long Cold Spell Settles Into Vermont After Our Icy Storm

In this map, the dotted red lines over Greenland
and northern Canada represent comparatively 
warm air squashing colder air southward
into souther Canada and the northern United
States. The solid lines show the general 
air flow that is roughly northwest to
southeast towards us. This map is a prediction
for early January. Click on the map to 
make it bigger and easier to see.

 We're done with our ice storm here in Vermont. we're back to our regularly scheduled cold winter weather. 

The gusty overnight winds materialized, which caused new spikes in power outages overnight, but as of this morning, things are back under control. A little over 100 homes and businesses were still without power in eastern Vermont as of 8:30 a.m.

Now, it's going to just stay cold and rather dry for a long time. The cause of this upcoming frigid, bland weather pattern takes us to Greenland. And northern Canada. 

Yes, Greenland again. Or at least the air flow over the top of this huge, frigid pile of ice in the Arctic.  

It's called the Greenland block or negative Arctic oscillation. Basically. a huge, balmy northward bulge in the jet stream, or high pressure oozes over Greenland, and often continues into northern Canada. That's what's happening now. 

The high pressure up in the Arctic means they'll have oddly warm weather. At least toasty by their winter standards. The bitter cold of the Arctic under a negative Arctic oscillation gets squashed southward into southern Canada and the northern United States. 

Sometimes. this negative Arctic oscillation is accompanied by a separate northward bulge in the jet stream over Alaska. This creates a jet stream that originates in Siberia, then races southward through central Canada into the United States. That would delivery horribly unwanted packages of extreme, perhaps record cold to our neck of the woods.   

The incredible, record cold in Vermont we saw in January, 1970 and December, 1989 was brought to us by this nasty, Siberian pattern. 

However, we're in luck this time. Instead of the northern bulge in the jet stream over Alaska, there's a bit of a southward dip up there. We'll still be cold, because, remember, the cold Canadian air that usually hangs out in the high Arctic has been squashed southward to where we live. But the developing weather pattern won't give us access to that awful, gelid air from Siberia.

The end result will be a steady diet of colder than normal weather for us in Vermont. It means we'll frequently have days with highs in the teens to low 20s. Overnights on some nights will be near zero. But at least we should at least mostly avoid those old fashioned, terrible nights when we suffer in temperatures down in the 20s and 30s below. 

Thank gawd for small wins. 

There might be some brief squirts of slightly milder air ahead of some of the relentless parade of cold fronts. But those mild moments only mean seasonably chilly air. The bottom line is we should prepare ourselves for a nippy era of boring weather for the opening days of the New Year. 

These negative Arctic oscillation episodes tend to get "stuck," meaning that they don't go away easily. So we could be trapped in this cold weather for perhaps two weeks. Maybe more. Sometimes these patterns can last a month or more. 

Sometimes, this weather pattern can also mean a lot of snow for us. But that usually happens when there's a northward bulge in the jet stream in Alaska. The jet stream plunges south toward the Gulf of Mexico, picks up moisture, then goes up the East Coast as nor'easters. 

But we don't have that northward bulge in the jet stream in Alaska. So, we'll have a roughly northwest to southeast weather pattern. A  series of weak weather systems that would come through every couple of days, throwing bursts of light snow and flurries at us. 

Usually, this setup does give the mountains unspectacular but decent snowfalls to the ski areas so that's a good thing. There's always a chance one of these disturbances could do something weird and give us a nice big dump of snow. But for now, I don't see it.  

This winter has so far been more rough than we've gotten used to in this age of climate change. That trend will probably continue into January. 

Monday Evening Vermont Storm Update: Everything To Freeze Up As Arctic Winds Arrive

Route 5 near Hartland today. Photo by
Isabella Belisle, via Facebook.

The freezing rain part of our storm is just about over, but we now get to look forward to all the remaining slush and water turning to hard, slippery ice again. We will also get to not-so-joyfully experience crashing temperatures, gusty winds and sharp, almost painful wind chills. 

Most places got between 0.15 to 0.25 inches of ice that coated everything outdoors. Many of us in the Champlain Valley never saw it because it changed to plain rain a little ahead of sunrise, before most of us got up. In other places, it kept going. 

The highest ice accumulation I saw was 0.5 inches in Warren, 0.4 inches in Chittenden and 0.38 inches in Cabot and Chelsea.

Vermont State Police said that from Sunday evening to 11 a.m. Monday they responded to 92 weather-related crashes across the state, three of which resulted in injuries. Of those crashes 29 of them happened on Interstate highways and the rest were on secondary roads. 

Power outages across Vermont continued to rise through the morning peaking at around 10:45 a.m today. As of 4:15 p.m or so, outages were down to only about 700, mostly in east-central Vermont.  

Overall precipitation amounts were healthy, too. Most of central and northern Vermont received between 0.75 and one inch of rain and melted ice. Far southern parts of the state saw a little over an inch. 

Since not that much snow cover melted, the water content of it really increased. It's going to be that crunchy gross stuff if you walk through it tomorrow. 

LOOKING AHEAD

Traffic cam grab showed ice still on the trees along
Interstate 89 in Brookfield. As winds increase tonight,
some of the weighted down branches might break,
spawning new power outages. 

At 3 p.m, shortly before the cold front began to press into Vermont,   it had gotten above freezing almost everywhere in Vermont, according to reports. 

There were almost definitely cold hollows east of the Green Mountains that were still below freezing. 

It was 32 degrees in Eden. Other places, like Springfield and Lyndonville, were still at 33 degrees. Most of the rest of the state was only in the mid-30s.    

Traffic camera images in a few spots showed ice still weighing down the trees. I notices it when I did spot checks on Route 302 in Topsham, Interstate 89 in Brookfield and Route 11 in Winhall.

I'm sure ice is still on trees in a lot of other places. I bring this up because the wind will get pretty noticeable as we go through the evening. By later tonight and tomorrow, a lot of us will experience gusts over 30 mph. Maybe 40 mph in a few spots. 

Those winds could knock down a few more ice-laden branches, which would trigger a few more power outages. I don't expect anything too widespread, but keep your devices charged anyway, especially if the tree are all icy outside. 

If you still have ice encasing your car, try to get out there right away and scrape it off before it gets below freezing. Waiting until it gets really cold will make the job really hard. Remember to get the ice of all of your vehicle. If not, you'll be liable for damages if a slab of ice flies off your car or  truck and hits the person in back of you on the highway. 

If you're looking for replacement snow, especially powder after this icy episode, you're pretty much out of luck. Most places will see an inch per less of snow tonight and tomorrow. For the most part, it will be just nuisance snow showers for the rest of the week. The mountains might pick ups few inches, but that's about it. 

It'll get down to 10 degrees, give or take by tomorrow morning and stay in the teens all day. 

Obviously, as noted,  any standing water or slush on your driveway, the roads, and sidewalks will harden into ice tonight and make things treacherous in spots for the foreseeable future. 

Here's why: It's going to stay cold through the upcoming weekend and probably beyond.  I'll get into how cold the week will be and why this is happening in tomorrow morning's post.  

 

Powerful Storm Causes Havoc From Minnesota To Quebec.

Tornado damage in Mount Zion, Illinois. A powerful wide
ranging storm not only produced the tornadoes,
but spread heavy snow, freezing rain, high winds
and other weather problems from Minnesota to
Quebec and beyond. Photo via Facebook by
Storm Chaser Jordan Hall. 

While we dealt with ice here in Vermont last night and this morning, the same storm continues to cause havoc across wide areas of the Midwest and southern Canada. 

Arguably the scariest part of the storm was a mini outbreak of tornados in Illinois.

Six tornadoes were reported in Illinois. The worst of them hit the town of Mount Zion, Illinois, where eight homes were reportedly destroyed or seriously damaged.  

Elsewhere, the trouble was much more wintry. 

The storm's powerful cold front brought plunging temperatures across the Midwest and South. In Memphis the temperature dropped from 72 to 53 degrees in just 20 minutes on Sunday. 

 In the Upper Peninsula of Michigan, two feet of snow had fallen in some areas by Monday morning. Winds were also gusting as high as 60 mph up there, so you can imagine the whiteouts and snow drifts.

In lower Michigan, freezing rain cut power to 115,000 customers. 

Parts of Wisconsin got nearly a foot of snow, with amounts over six inches in much of the state.

Snow totals in Minnesota amounted to five to nine inches, which isn't extreme, but the winds gusted to 55 mph in some areas, causing whiteouts on some roads. 

A 150-mile section of Interstate 35 was shut down in southern Minnesota and northern Iowa during the height of the storm.  

In Ontario, Canada, several highways shut down due to heavy snow, blowing snow and freezing rain. Power was cut to homes and businesses in southern and eastern Ontario due to freezing rain. 

Strong winds and snow squalls are threatening more power outages in Ontario. Freezing rain also caused havoc across southern Quebec, including the cities of Ottawa, Montreal and Quebec City.

High winds also swept western New York this morning and early afternoon, cutting power to tens of thousands of customers there. Winds gusted to 72 mph in Lackawanna, New York and 66 mph in Niagara, New York.

The lake effect snow machine is cranking up.  One to two feet of snow are expected in western New York's snowbelt areas with up to two feet expected. As of 1 p.m. today, Buffalo was reporting heavy snow with wind gusts to 58 mph.  

Video by Live Storms Media showed lakeshore flooding, near zero visibility in snow, near hurricane force winds and a sizable branch falling on the videographer. He didn't appear to be seriously injured. 

The ice spread through New York, Vermont and into New Hampshire.  About 20,000 power outages were reported in New Hampshire. A section of Interstate 89 had to shut down in New Hampshire due to crashes. 

The strong storm was over southwestern Quebec early this afternoon. It will meander toward the Gaspe Peninsula of eastern Quebec by tomorrow, then curl westward to Hudson Bay on Wednesday. That'll ensure a flood of frigid air flowing into the Great Lakes states and Northeast for the next several days. 

Unrelated to this storm, strong Santa Ana winds are blowing through southern California. Since they just had that big storm, there's little risk of them starting huge, deadly wildfires, like we saw last January

But since the ground is so wet, it'll be easier for trees to topple in today's strong winds. Rain is coming back to southern California later this week, but the storm won't be as big as the one that hit around Christmas. Still, flooding is a risk on New Year's Eve once again in the L.A. area.

And a program note, I'll have a Vermont-oriented update on this storm late this afternoon.  

Vermont Monday Morning Storm Update: Could Have Been Worse, But Still Icy/Messy. More Drama Ahead

An example of the challenge the freezing rain brought
this morning This traffic cam grab shows the pavement
on Route 125 in Ripton looking absolutely scary icy,
with trees weighed down by the ice, too. 

By 7:30 this morning, I heard the welcome thump of snow sliding off my roof here in St. Albans, Vermont. 

The told me the temperature was above freezing here, and the threat of more icing had passed. 

We're lucky the worst of this hit overnight. All roads were virtually impassable across the state at the peak of the icing late last night and in the predawn hours. 

Because the roads were so bad, all state offices were closed today. People who could work remotely were still on the job, but state officials warned that electricity and internet connectivity might be iffy. 

Overall, temperatures around dawn today were a little warmer than forecast, which is great news. Freezing rain overnight and this morning is still extensive, but not as disastrous as some forecasts last evening indicated. 

It turns out not many of us will have an half inch of ice or more breaking trees and power lines. A few places will have that, but not many. And there's plenty of trouble spots this morning. 

Let's got west to east across Vermont for a morning assessment:

Champlain Valley/Souithwest Vermont

As of 7:30 p.m. temperatures in the far southwest near Bennington were in the upper 30s, with mid 30s in the Champlain Valley. Main roads in those spots were just wet for your morning commute. But untreated surfaces like dirt roads, driveways and sidewalks were still awful. 

Try to avoid those dirt roads for awhile yet. And for gawd's sake watch your step. Here at my place in St Albans, the tree have no ice on them, but my driveway is scary as hell. 

Some places in western Vermont that are protected from the winds were still seeing freezing rain. Rutland and Middlebury were still at 32 degrees as of 7 a.m. 

Traffic cameras along Route 4 in West Rutland and Fair Haven still showed slick pavement and iced up trees as of a little bit before 8 a.m. I notice a smattering of power outages in central Rutland County. 

Central/Eastern Vermont

Traffic cam grab on Route 4 in Quechee a little
before 8 a.m. this morning looked pretty slick
Note that pine tree in the background was
sagging under the ice pretty badly. 

As expected, it's worse out there once you get to the Green Mountains and points east. A few places, like Montpelier and St. Johnsbury, were a bit above freezing before 8 a.m., many other places in this one were still at or a little below 32 degrees. 

Roads conditions on traffic cameras in these areas looked varied. Most of Interstate 91 seemed wet, with some icy areas. Some secondary roads had a mix of bare pavement and ice, and other roads looked like skating rinks

The bulk of the power outages as of 8 a.m. were close to Montpelier and in the Connecticut River Valley between Rockingham and St. Johnsbury. Nearly 3,700 homes and businesses were without power as of around 7 a.m., but that declined slightly to 3,200 or so by 7:45 a.m.  That might be a hint that the worst is behind us, fingers crossed!

REST OF TODAY

It was still raining pretty hard and steadily around Vermont as of 8 a.m. That will continue more or less for a few more hours. It looks like this morning's rain will be steadier and heavier in the southern half of the state, compared to the north. 

The rain statewide will tend to get a little more showery as we head toward late morning, and the bulk of the rain should be done by 4 p.m or so, if not earlier.   

The storm's cold front will blow through early this afternoon, changing any remaining rain to snow towards dusk.

But by then, we will have lost the deeper moisture, so we won't have much accumulation.  But by the evening commute, any water left over on the roads your driveway, your walkway will freeze, so it will continue to be dangerous underfoot.

Dustings of snow atop the ice will make it even more slick. The northern and central Green Mountains might pick up two or three inches of snow by tomorrow morning, so nothing spectacular.

Since it will be cold for the foreseeable future, you will need to be careful for the next several days, or even weeks, as the ice on untreated surfaces will remain. 

This will be a sharp return to frigid weather. Temperatures will be within a few degrees either side of 10 degrees by dawn Tuesday. Gusty winds will make it feel much colder. 

It looks like for at least the next week starting tomorrow, it will stay colder and drier than normal with only light snows. I'll get more into that in future posts, once we get past today's storm.  

Sunday Evening Storm: Midwest Has Blizzards And Tornadoes, Vermont/New England Still Bracing For Ice

A view of the increasing clouds during the middle of
this afternoon over St. Albans, Vermont ahead of 
tonight's ice. If you look carefully at the horizon, it's
hazy. Pollutants were being trapped under the
inversion that will make the overnight
freezing rain possible. 

We still are on track for a spell of icy, dangerous driving weather here in Vermont, part of an intense storm that continues to raise havoc around the Great Lakes and Midwest.  

I  don't think I've seen a winter storm in the United States this powerful and wide ranging, with such a wide variety of weather and strong winds since December, 2022. 

I also think in New England, this might be arguably be the most extensive ice storm since 2008.

Here in Vermont, both the 2022 storm, which caused extensive wind damage in Vermont, was definitely worse than this will be, The 2008 ice storm mainly caused some problems in southern Vermont and really trashed central New England. 

The 2008 storm cut power to 30,000 homes and businesses in southern Vermont. We'll see how close we get to that tomorrow, but I'm so far convinced it won't be as bad as in 2008.

The general outlook for this storm here in Vermont hasn't changed much since this morning. Everybody is still in line to get a dose of freezing rain. 

The winter weather advisory is still in effect statewide. Except for most of eastern Vermont. There, the advisory has been upgraded to an ice storm warning. Some areas under that ice storm warning could get a half inch of ice accumulation. That's definitely enough for some trees, branches and power lines to fail.

The warning also states that travel will be nearly impossible during tomorrow morning's commute 

It still looks like the freezing rain will advance from the southwest during the first part of the night, arriving everywhere south and west of Interstate 89 by 11 p.m. or so. It'll spread into the rest of the state over the next couple of hours after that. 

East of the Green Mountains, the freezing rain will probably last well into Monday morning in most places. We're still looking at enough ice in some spots to weigh down tree and power lines enough to break them. 

I'd charge all your devices this evening and pop down to the store real quick if you need any more food or supplies to get you through tomorrow. Also, if possible, move your car from beneath any branches that might give way.

Above freezing temperatures might arrive in the Champlain Valley a wee bit earlier than predicted this morning. That might improve the morning commute there a bit. Again, we'll see.

But even if it's above freezing, pavement that hasn't been salted or sanded will still super icy.  The thin scrim of snow now on gravel roads will have been turned to ice by dawn and stay that way much of the morning. 

So it's no picnic in the Champlain Valley, either. 

It also still looks like almost everyone east of the Greens will have a brief interlude during the afternoon where it gets above freezing. That should melt at least some of the ice.   

The more ice that comes off the trees and power lines the better during that thawing, because winds will really pick up tomorrow night as temperatures plunge. Those winds could gust as high as 40 mph. This is a windy, big storm system after all. 

It'll be in the low teens, give or take, by Tuesday morning. Backside snowfall Monday night and Tuesday won't amount to much. Most valleys will have an inch or less, while the central and northern Green Mountains could pick up a few inches.

THE STORM ELSEWHERE 

As expected, blizzard conditions are raging in parts of Minnesota and are moving into the Upper Peninsula of Michigan. 

A no travel advisory was in effect in much of western and southern Minnesota due to heavy snow and strong winds this afternoon. A blizzard warning is still in effect for parts of the state this evening. 

 Not far to the south and east, in Illinois and Indiana, the storm pulled oddly warm, humid air from the Gulf of Mexico. Temperatures there reached the mid-60s to low 70s. Dewpoints were in the sticky low 60s, which is incredibly high for this time of year. 

The system's approaching strong cold front was slamming into the muggy air, setting off some pretty strong thunderstorms in Illinois and Indiana. A tornado watch was in effect in the two states late this afternoon. A few tornado warnings have also been issued for the area.

The same places in which tornadoes might have touched down will see temperatures in the teens by morning. Talk about a flip-flop!

Trump Administration's Obnoxiousness With Greenland Is Tacit Acknowledgment Of Climate Change

The United States is again making dumb noises about
annexing Greenland, diplomacy and legality be
damned. While the Trump administration denies
climate change exists, this whole mess
is largely about climate change. 

Greenland is back in the news again, as the Trump Administration is ramping up its efforts to take control of the big Arctic ice heap.  It's a move that practically nobody else wants other that Donald Trump and his not-so-merry band of MAGA cultists. 

One irony is that Donald Trump denies the existence of climate change, yet that very real warming of the planet is a big part of what's behind all this. 

To back up here, Trump last week appointed Louisiana Gov. Jeff Landry as his envoy to Greenland. Landry said he would travel to Greenland to convince people living there to become part of the United States. 

Good luck with that. 

Greenland is a self-governing Danish territory. Officials in Greenland, Denmark and the European Union unanimously condemned Trump effort to annex Greenland.  A big majority of Greenlanders want increased independence from Denmark, but they really, really don't want to become part of the U.S.

Somebody from MAGA always says the quiet part out loud, and the ever-reliable Fox host Brian Kilmeade gave us this:

"Greenland has been ignored by Denmark for decades. Now they're not, because we have shown interest. They have about 60,000 people there and we have a huge military base. Look, we are going to need their natural resources to mine them - you'll (Denmark) be able to get some of that. But in the meantime, we have to expand our base there and access to the waterways, because the Arctic is melting and we need access there. 

Russia and China is (sic) trying to dominate. Plus, what are we in, the era of the Viking? What is Denmark doing in our backyard?"

Phew! There's a lot to unpack there. Our "need" for natural resources, as if we could just go in and take them.  Sure, Donald Trump said we need Greenland for security, not minerals. But it's about the minerals as much as it is about security. Especially in the sense of  how much money the grifters associated with Trump can make from exploiting Greenland.  

Kilmeade seems to think it's horrible that puny little Greenland wants to control its own future and puny little Denmark should have the gaul to be in control of Denmark.

Greenland is in our backyard, since it's hooked on to North America. Trump is like the homeowner who sees a ball accidentally thrown into his yard by neighborhood kids. He's the type that would keep the ball instead of throwing it back over to the kids. 

CLIMATE CONNECTION

But since this is a climate and weather blog, there's one piece in Kilmeade's screed that I want to focus on. It's where he said "the Arctic is melting."

I thought all the MAGA types deny human-caused climate change. They say it's a hoax. So why is the Arctic melting? It's true that Greenland is pretty steadily losing some of its massive ice cap to a warming world. 

Maybe Kilmeade will sputter that the climate changes "naturally," but how do you explain such a massive melt that developed over decades, not centuries like most of Earth's past episodes of natural warming and cooling?

Ultimately Trump's one-sided crush on Greenland is about the climate change that he publicly denies exists. 

As Al Jazeera tells us:

"Climate change and a rapidly melting ice sheet are the main reasons the Arctic has become a geopolitical hotspot

The Arctic is heating at a rate four times faster than the global average, increasing its accessibility for maritime trade routes and resource exploration - including by non-arctic countries as well as those with an Arctic presence. 

China has deployed vessels capable of serving both military surveillance and research functions in the region. The purposes are to collect data and secure access to resources and shipping lanes, which are emerging as a result of melting ice."

In addition, Russia is deploying missile systems and weapons testing in the Arctic, and has grown its naval presence near the top of the world. Canada is planning to shore up its military and diplomatic presence in the Arctic because of those Chinese and Russian moves in and near Greenland. 

So the security risk is real, but as usual, Trump's bluster, lies and utter untrustworthiness is botching it. 

Russia and Chinese military and espionage geeks are undoubtedly loving all of this.

What probably would have made a lot more sense was to light a fire under the European Union over the Arctic security threats, then negotiate some sort of alliance involving Denmark, the U.S. and other European nations as a counterweight to Russian and Chinese threats in Greenland and elsewhere in the Arctic.  

But nope! Trump just has to be a clownish bully to appease his own fragile ego and the expense of the rest of the world. 

For years we've been told that a warming planet would make political, social and military conflicts more likely. It's too bad Trump is working os hard in aiding and abetting the "hoax' climate change to make all that happen sooner and more dangerously than most of us thought.   

Monday Morning Storm Update: Lots Of Ice For Vermont, Lots Of Havoc Elsewhere In The U.S.

Map from the National Weather Service in South
Burlington shows predicted ice accumulation
tonight and Monday. Areas in read could receive
a quarter inch or more of ice, which might
lead to a few power outages. Roads will be
terrible everywhere late tonight and 
Monday morning. 

Good morning! 

As we get ready for our looming icy weather here in Vermont, I have an editor's note. This update might be somewhat scattered and incomplete as I'm staying at a hotel with a malfunctioning router. Hard to get anything done with that situation.

 That technological whine out of the way, it's time to whine about the icy weather. 

A giant storm is about to cause havoc from Minnesota to Maine, and elsewhere with an incredible variety of dangerous weather. I'll get into how it'll affect other places in a bit, but for my Vermont readers, let's start with the Green Mountain State. 

It was another frigid morning here in Vermont this morning, with most of us clocking in below zero at dawn. A couple places near Lake Champlain were just above zero, but that's about it. 

This all helps set the stage for our icy storm for tonight and Monday. You'll have the calm before the storm today, with light winds and increasing clouds overhead. It'll be seasonably cold with highs in the 20s. 

The steady freezing rain will start between 8 and 10 p.m. in southern Vermont, reach to a point along Interstate 89  between 10 p.m. and midnight and perhaps a little after midnight in the Northeast Kingdom, according to the National Weather Service office in Burlington. 

This is an estimate, as the freezing rain could arrive slightly earlier or later than I've outlined here. Just to be safe, if you're headed home to Vermont, or wherever you might be driving in the state, try to be there by 7 or 8 this evening. We're under a winter weather advisory from 7 p.m. today to 4 p.m. Monday. 

This is a strong storm with lots of moisture. It's essentially drawing an atmospheric river northward from the Gulf of Mexico into the Great Lakes states and Northeast.  For us, that means the freezing rain will come down pretty hard, and accumulate pretty quickly on everything. 

In the Champlain Valley, slightly warmer air should come to the rescue, changing the freezing rain to rain around dawn. The pavement will still be cold, so ice will continue to accumulate there after the temperature  gets to 33 or 34 or so. But the "warmer" air should limit ice accumulation to less than a quarter inch. 

Be prepared for a slow commute amid the freezing rain and rain in the Champlain Valley. Watch your step on untreated sidewalks, driveways, outdoor staircases and such.  You can really hurt or even kill yourself in a fall outdoors in an ice storm, A fall that involves banging your head on the ground can lead to permanent disability. I know I'm not exactly being a bundle of laughs here, but ice is serious.

In most of the rest of the state, it will be even worse. 

The subfreezing temperatures should hang on well into the morning in much of the rest of Vermont, especially east of the Greens. The horrible road conditions will continue. But there's other dangers. 

You begin to get a few isolated problems with broken tree limbs and power lines once ice gets to be a quarter inch thick on everything. 

Most places east of the Greens are forecast to receive that magical quarter inch of ice, and a few places might approach a half inch.

So I expect a few power outages there. Some trees and branches will come down. Parts of northern New York, New Hampshire and Maine are in the same boat with that 

Eventually, pretty much all of us go to plain rain as afternoon temperatures rise to roughly the 35 to 40 degree range. A few colder pockets northeast might hang on to the freezing rain all day. Rain and melted ice will amount to three quarters of an inch to an inch in most spots, so it's a pretty substantial storm.

We're not done yet. 

By later Monday afternoon and Monday evening, the storm's sharp cold front arrives. We'll see a gush of strong west winds and rapidly falling temperatures, and some snow showers. It could briefly snow really hard in some places. That means things will get messy again as everything freezes up and the additional snow makes things worse

We really don't have a perfect bead on when the cold front comes through. Hopefully the worst hits after the Monday afternoon drive time but I'm not sure yet. We'll have more on this with later updates.

STORM HAVOC ELSEWHERE

This is one powerful storm that will be strengthening fast as it moves through the Great Lakes and into southeast Canada over the next day or so. 

Several areas are under blizzard warnings. One such blizzard warning goes from eastern North Dakota through western and southern Minnesota into northern Iowa. Winds today into tomorrow morning could gust to 55 mph in this area as four to 10 inches of snow blasts through. 

An even more impressive blizzard warning is up for the Upper Pennisula of Michigan, where up to two feet of snow will fall today and tomorrow amid gust to 65 mph.  Those intense winds will also push Lake Superior water into shoreline areas of the northern Upper Peninsula. 

The storm's winds will be so strong that they are expected to cause a seiche on Lake Eries. A seiche is caused by strong winds that will  essentially tilt the lake by pushing water into its eastern end. ,Which means the Lake Erie water will be strangely low near Toledo, Ohio, but flood shorelines in places like Buffalo, Hamburg and Dunkirk, New York. 

Western New York is really kind of ground zero for this storm anyway, given all the trouble they'll see from this monster. Heavy rain from tonight into early Monday could cause flooding along streams and rivers in that region. 

Once the cold front arrives, strong west winds could gust to 70 mph in parts of western New York, especially near Buffalo and Niagara. Then, Monday and well into the upcoming week,  lake effect snows are likely to dump one to two feet of snow, locally more,  on the eastern ends of Lakes Erie and Ontario.

Since this storm is so huge and intense, it's generating a lot of wind through an enormous area. Wind advisories and warnings stretch from Texas to the Dakotas, then through the entire Great Lakes region and into much of the Northeast. 

 

Saturday Morning Update: Snow Ending, Freezing Rain Looms Sunday Night/Monday

The latest National Weather Service forecast for
ice accumulation from freezing rain Sunday night
and Monday. Areas in red could get a quarter inch
of ice or more. A quarter inch is where you start to
get some scattered tree and power line damage. 

As expected, it snowed overnight in most of Vermont.

I'm writing this early, so I don't have much in the way of accumulation reports. Here in St. Albans, we received an inch of fluff. There's probably at least a few inches of new snow on the ground in southwest Vermont. 

As of 6:30 a.m. I could hear the snowplows circulating around Franklin County and I'm sure the same is true all across the state. Except maybe in parts of the Northeast Kingdom where it didn't snow. 

It'll be a quiet, cold weekend, but we're already gearing up for our next storm. Skies might be a little slow to clear today, but the sun is expected to come out at some point. Tonight will be clear, and that means cold. Lows should once again be within a few degrees either side of zero for most of us. 

Light winds Sunday mean that warm air moving in aloft won't be able to mix down into the valleys easily, which sets us up for our icy weather Sunday night and early Monday.  As we've been advertising, we have a bunch of freezing rain to deal with to deal with.

FREEZING RAIN ALERT

 If you have anywhere to drive around Vermont, try to be home by 7 p.m. Sunday. Light bits of freezing rain could start by that hour, and it doesn't take much to make a mess of the roads. The bulk of the ice will start a bit later, maybe 10 or 11 p.m.  Keep an eye on forecast, though. The timing might change with  updated information. 

Freezing rain should hit everywhere in Vermont Sunday night. But some places will warm up faster than others as we get into the early morning hours Monday. 

At this point, I'd count on icy, dangerous driving conditions pretty much everywhere when it's time to go to work or school or wherever you're going Monday morning. If you can work from home, definitely do that. 

Places like the valleys of southwest Vermont and the Champlain Valley will get above freezing first. At this point, those areas could poke above freezing at around dawn. But it's been cold, so even if it's 33 or 34 degrees or something like that, rain will probably still freeze on contact with roads and sidewalks. If it's above freezing where you are Monday morning, don't take that as an all clear. It'll still be a mess out there. 

I have a feeling emergency rooms will be busy Monday treating people for injuries from falls on the ice. Best to be careful, or stay in, especially if - no offense - you're older and have more brittle bones 

Eastern Vermont is an even bigger problem with this storm. The freezing rain will last further into the morning. And rainfall rates might be a little higher on the eastern slopes of the Green Mountains than in the west. 

That means more ice that will last longer. In addition to the atrocious road conditions, there's a chance of some tree damage and power outages east of the Greens. 

This will by no means be anywhere close to the scale of the Great Ice Storm of 1998. But the eastern half for Vermont especially might have a few scattered problems with ice-laden branches sagging into power lines, or branches breaking off trees entirely. 

I'll also throw in a note saying that forecasting freezing rain ice accumulation is a tricky business. There could easily be less or more ice accumulating than the current forecast for your area. It all depends om when the slightly warmer air can mix down to the ground where you live.

Eventually, everybody gets into the "warm" air for a little while Monday afternoon. We should get into the 30s to low 40s. But the storm's cold front is scheduled to come in during the late afternoon or early evening. 

That'll drop temperatures back below 32 degrees really quickly. Remaining ice from the morning will harden up, and any puddles will freeze too. It won't get above freezing again for a long time after Monday. So we'll be stuck with the ice underfoot for a long time. 

We'll get some snow on the back side of the storm, too as we go through Monday night. Not much in the valleys. but the mountains could pick up several inches. A reinforcing shot of Arctic air from Canada on New Year's Day will probably add a bit more light snow to the landscape.  

Friday Evening Storm Update: A Real Mess In the Northeast. Even Vermont Is In Play Now

That weird storm diving down from the Great Lakes
to the Mid-Atlantic states seems to be taking a jog
a little further north and east than earlier expected.
Southwest Vermont is now in play for several inches
of snow and up to two inches might fall
along the Interstate 89 corridor 

 The expected path of that weird storm in the Northeast has taken a jog north compared to previous forecast. 

That means we here in Vermont tonight will get more snow out of it than expected. We won't get hammered the way central New York and the New York City metro area will, but parts of southwest Vermont are now in play for as much as eight inches of snow.   

A winter weather advisory has been hoisted for Bennington and Windham counties as those places could get six inches of snow, give or take. That's a lot more than the one or two inches that was in the forecast for those areas less than 24 hours ago. 

The expected snow totals on a line from Springfield to west of Rutland might get perhaps three inches. Along Interstate 89, total accumulations would be about 1.5 inches, give or take. At least that's what the forecast is calling for as of late this afternoon. The Northeast Kingdom should only see nothing to as much as an inch o snow.  

The problem with forecasting this thing is that under the most intense band of snow in central New York, the flakes could come down at a rate of up to three inches per hours. The gradient between super heavy snow in central New York and virtually no snow at all in we're guessing central New England is steep. 

The computer models even right before the snow begins don't have the track of this thing nailed down. If it goes just a little further north and east than expected, there could be several inches of snow in some parts of Vermont, especially southwestern areas. If it jogs a little south and west, we get next to nothing 

This is a very quick mover. Where it snows, it'll start sometime between 8 and 11 p.m. tonight and finish up by 4 or 5 a.m. Saturday. 

If you're driving anywhere, you still might encounter snowy roads through Saturday morning, especially  in southern Vermont. 

Whatever happens it'll pretty much be over by Saturday morning, so it would just leave behind some iffy roads. Temperatures during the snow and early tomorrow morning will be around 10 degrees, give or take That's too cold for road salt to work well. 

It'll be a fluffy snow, so it will be easy to shovel. And it will settle quite a bit over the next few days. Eight inches of snow would become four inches within a couple days. 

NORTHEAST HEADACHES

It's much worse elsewhere in the Northeast. 

Nearly 1,500 U.S. flights were canceled as of 4:45 p.m. today, according to FlightAware. Another 5,900 domestic flights are delayed. This is all hitting on the busiest travel day of the year. 

Over a quarter of today's flights, or about  350 of 'em were canceled today at John F. Kennedy International Airport, CNBC reported. More than 200 flights were scrubbed at Newark's airport. 

The snow hadn't even started in New York yet when the flights were canceled, but airline often cancel flights before big storms begin so that planes, crews and connecting travelers don't get stuck. 

New York City has been experiencing a snow drought in recent years. The last time the city got a snowstorm the size this one is expected to be was on January 28-29, 2022. On that occasion, the storm total at Central Park was 8.5 inches. 

Much of Pennsylvania and parts of New Jersey are either experiencing an ice storm or are about to

This storm will zip out to sea Saturday morning to make way for the next, warmer storm Sunday night and Monday. Back up here in Vermont, that one still looks like it'll give us our dose of freezing rain.

 

California Endures Storms Again Today, But It's Finally Ending

A home buried in mud and rocks after a
debris flow in Wrightwood, California
Widespread storms and atmospheric
rivers have plagued California
for more than a week now 

The giant storm in California is starting to ease today, after causing days of havoc from the Oregon border all the way down to Mexico. 

The storms targeting southern California over the Christmas holiday have so far claimed at least three lives. 

Another person died in San Diego when a large tree branch fell on him, reported television station KGTV.  At least 90 trees fell across the city of San Diego. 

Videos are at the bottom of this post. 

A number of people were plucked from flooded cars on streets and highway throughout southern California. 

One of the hardest hit areas is the community of Wrightwood in the San Gabriel Mountains, where several homes were buried under several feet of mud, notes KTLA.

Video showed some houses with four feet of rocks and mud inside them. Cars were buried halfway up their windows Two people died and six others were injured on a wet freeway..

Downtown Los Angeles on Wednesday received 2.53 inches of rain, which is a bit more than what normally falls in the entire month of December. Other totals from just December 24 include 3.96 in Woodland Hills and 3.39 in Burbank. 

Before the storms hit the L.A area, the atmospheric rivers targeted northern California. Redding, California was probably the hardest hit. The city had 5.3 inches of rain from December 16 to 22, with much more in the higher elevations nearby. 

A 74-year old man died when he drove around barricades and got swept up in the flooding. 

High winds also tore through the Golden State. 

 Santa Cruz Harbor reported a gust to 91 mph. Several boats were not surprisingly damaged. Likely not a tornado, say NWS. Pablo Point, about 20 miles northwest of San Francisco reported a gust to 108 mph. 

About 125,000 people lost power in central and northern California over the Christmas holiday.  

Heavy snow has been falling in the Sierra Nevada range, with some places clocking in with several feet of snow.

Interstate 80 through Donner Summit was impassable at times over the holiday as vehicles got stuck, crashed or spun out. 

 Rain continues in southern California today, though it's not coming down as heavily as it did Wednesday and Thursday. But now that the ground is sodden from the storms, so the somewhat lighter rain could really set off more debris flows and mudslides. Los Angeles itself could get another one to two inches of rain today. The mountains could get another three inches. 

After that, practically no rain is expected in California until later Wednesday or Thursday. 

Videos:

A scary tour of flooded Redding, California on December 21. Click on this link to view, or if you see the image below, click on that. 

Next video shows a motorist stupidly driving into fast flowing water and getting swept away. So what does the next car do when they see this? Drive into the fast flowing water and get swept away. People are dumb. They were both eventually rescued, by the way. This was in Palmdale, California. Click on this link to view, as always, or if you see the image below, click on that. 

Aftermath of the huge debris flow in Wrightwood, California. Click on this link to view, or if you see the image below, click on that. 

Vermont Christmas Is Over, Winter Weather Drags On

The sky looking west from St Albans, Vermont at dawn
today had those pink and baby blue tones that I've 
always associated with a subzero winter cold snap. 

We woke up this day after Christmas in Vermont to the coldest morning since December 7. 

Skies cleared out above a blanket of fresh snow and a big supply of Canadian air to drop large sections of Vermont and surrounding areas below zero as dawn broke. Those of us who stayed above that frigid zero mark did so just barely. 

The chill isn't that unusual for late December - Burlington got down to 2 above this morning, missing the record low for the date by a huge 28 degrees. But it's not comfortable out there, either. 

From my perch on St. Albans hill, I can see that St. Albans Bay appears to be frozen, earlier than in recent years. This really has been a colder winter than usual so far. Pretty stormy, too. 

That trend is going to continue. 

WEIRD STORM

High thin clouds will make an appearance over Vermont today and thicken as the afternoon wears on. It'll stay cold as highs only make it into the teens. 

This is due to a weird storm that will just brush by us, but cause havoc from Ontario to New Jersey. An Alberta clipper, as scheduled, is diving southeastward from Michigan to an eventual path that will take it off the Mid-Atlantic coast'.

The path of this storm is odd. So is it's strength, given it's a clipper, which usually aren't all that impressive. It was spreading snow through southern Ontario this morning and mixed precipitation in Michigan. 

It will intensify further as it heads southeast. An ice storm warning is up for western Pennsylvania today and tonight. Freezing rain there today and tonight will make travel scary to say the least. It also risks causing tree and power line damage. Today's not the day for a road trip to Pittsburgh, that's for sure. 

As the storm heads further south, it'll trigger a snowstorm from central New York down to the New York City metro area. That zone is in for five to nine inches of snow tonight. 

We in Vermont will just be mostly bystanders to this spectacle.  It'll snow a little in the Green Mountain State overnight, mostly south and west of Interstate 89. A little snow might get north of that, but it'll be inconsequential. There might be a couple inches down by Bennington. If the storm somehow manages to jog north a bit, then, of course we get a bit more snow. 

But this won't be a biggie for us. 

THE NEXT STORM 

The next system in the pipeline will be more of a problem for us. Those of  you who are thrilled we're missing out on today's ice storm in Pennsylvania aren't going to like this one. We're in for some ice Sunday night and Monday. 

Saturday and Sunday will be quiet and cold. Though, because we're setting up for freezing rain eventually, Sunday's highs on the Green Mountain summits will probably be warmer than the valleys.You need that type of inversion to get your freezing rain. 

That'll come in Sunday night. If you get your return trip home or to wherever you're headed by sunset on Sunday, you should be fine. 

At this point, fingers crossed, it doesn't look like the freezing rain will be enough to cause much damage to trees and power lines. But it will be more than enough to mess with anyone on the roads overnight Sunday into Monday morning.

If you have to work Monday, it will probably be an excellent day to work from home if at all possible. We haven't had much freezing rain and sleet yet this winter, so this will be our first real experience with it of the season. We don't have our "ice legs" yet.

,Yeah, it sucks. 

It will probably turn warm enough for awhile Monday to change things over to plain rain in much of Vermont. It won't be like a week ago though, when temperatures soared into the 50s and low 60s/

This time. it'll only make it into the mid and upper 30s. Maybe a few low 40s in southern valleys. The snow on the ground won't go away. It'll just get crusty and icy. 

The storm's cold front will probably sweep through later Monday afternoon or evening, as it looks now, anyway. The system will really crank up as it gets into southeast Canada, so expect plunging temperatures and strong northwest winds, which would continue into Tuesday. 

Most of us won't get much snow after the cold front goes through, but the central and northern Green Mountains have the potential to get a decent dump. 

It''ll stay really cold into the first few days of 2026, with a reinforcing shot of Arctic air probably arriving as we ring in the New Year. 

"Norlun Trough" Gives Part Of Maine A SUPER White Christmas

A Norlun trough, the dotted orange line on this map
from the storm off New England to southern Maine and 
beyond, caused heavy snow in parts of coastal Maine
Image from YouTube, Tim Kelley

 Northern New England is enjoying a white Christmas thanks to a mid-sized storm that passed through the region Tuesday and part of Wednesday.  

A section of Maine is really buried in the snow thanks to an unusual and hard to forecast phenomenon known as a Norlun Trough. 

We're geeking out a little, but here's what happened. 

As WMTW in Portland, Maine tells us, this trough is named after Steve Nogueira and Weir Lunstedt, two meteorologists who coined the term in a 1993 paper describing the phenomenon.  

They were researching a storm that dumped one to two feet of snow in parts of Maine in March, 1992. 

A Norlun trough is an elongated trough of low pressure extending outward on the northwest side of a storm sitting offshore.

The air over the ocean is cold, except for a thin layer near the surface which is heated by the relatively warm water. 

The trough is essentially a weakness in that fortress of cold air keeping that warm ocean air near the water surface. The warm ocean air shoots upward into that weakness/trough. It hits cold air above, and the moisture condenses into snow and blasts down on a small area along the Norlun trough.

More warm ocean air gets sucked into the vacuum created by that initial sharp updraft to keep the snow going. Heavy snow will fall in one spot until the Norlun trough moves away or breaks up. 

Norlun troughs are very hard to forecast, since they drop their heavy snow in a very small area. The National Weather Service office in Gray, Maine did manage to anticipate the Norlun trough Monday evening. Their forecast discussion at that time forecasted two to six inches so snow in most places. 

The forecast discussion also noted, "A Norlun trough setup may bring isolated amounts of up to a lot somewhere on the central Maine coast."

They underestimated it a little, but forecasters almost always do. But kudos to NWS/Gray for catching in advance. That doesn't always happen. 

Wednesday's Maine Norland trough meant business. Brunswick, Maine was buried beneath 16.8 inches of snow. Durham and Litchfield, Maine reported 15.5 inches. Freeport has about 16 inches. But just 20 miles away, around Portland, there was just five or six inches of new snow.  

Norlun troughs can extend inland all the way here into Vermont but their effects are often diminished this far inland.  I notices the trough Wednesday morning extended into the Northeast Kingdom, and snowfall was slightly higher there than in other parts of the state.