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| Bright blue skies greeted northwest Vermont this morning, behind a storm that turned out to be much more wet than white. A return to winter is coming, but it will take a few days to get here. |
And it was.
Temperatures were marginal throughout the atmosphere over Vermont for rain, sleet, freezing rain or snow. Just a degree or two more of warmth than expected enveloped the state, so it was mostly a cold rain. Or at least definitely more wet than white.
There was a little snow, especially toward the end of the main bout of precipitation early this morning. But predictions of one to as much as five inches of snow, mostly in the Northeast Kingdom, pretty much didn't come true.
I imagine a few spots up there got an inch or two, but that's probably it from last night. There were a few pockets of freezing rain, mostly in the southern Green Mountains, but it wasn't overly extensive.
Do note that I've noticed that even in places that never went below freezing last night, there was, as of mid-morning still a LOT of black ice untreated surfaces, pretty much statewide. Be careful on corners, on bridges, at stoplights and stop signs, and on foot!
Not only was the type of precipitation mostly wrong, the storm moved on just a little quicker than forecast. When we got up this morning around Vermont, many of us were greeted by sunshine.
The area of sunshine is pretty typical for a storm like this. A narrow band of dry air is often drawn northward immediately behind a departing storm. Other than some fog and low clouds in some areas east of the Green Mountains, the start of today in Vermont is rather bright and springlike.
It's kind of nice break from the general overcast and darkness we've endured lately.
Clouds typically fill in later as moisture wraps around the back side of the storm on northwest winds. That's what will happen later today and this evening. The sky will gradually get cluttered with clouds, the temperature will slowly fall and winds will pick up this afternoon.
Winter, sort of, is coming back. Snow showers will break out this evening and overnight. Some of them might even be briefly heavy in a few spots. But overall, this won't amount to much. Most valleys will see an inch or less of snow. Some of the central and northern Green Mountains could end up with a few inches of windblown fluff.
WINTER RESURGENT
For a week now, we've been advertising a big return to frigid winter weather. That's still definitely coming, but it's going to take a few days.
An enormous blob of Arctic air is gathering forces and strengthening as it prepares to invade the United States. But there's a bit of a traffic jam on the East Coast as an offshore northward bulge in the jet stream temporarily holds firm
A sharp, narrow dip in the jet stream is developing behind that bulge on the East Coast. At first, this will keep cold fronts to our west at bay. We'll stay on the mild side. Monday will end up being seasonably mild with highs within a few degrees either side of 30 degrees.
Tuesday and Wednesday will warm into the 30s. There might be a few snow and rain showers thrown in both days, but they shouldn't amount to much.
We'll finally get into the cold air Thursday, but there's a complication. The weather pattern is still gummed up. That atmospheric traffic jam looks like it will give a nor'easter an opportunity to evolve somewhere near or off the Northeast coast.
At this point, it looks like it'll get going too far south and east of Vermont to do us much good in terms of snow. And the cold air coming in is super dry, which discourages snow.
That being said, all this is several days away. There could be some atmospheric tricks that we're not aware of yet. One of those tricks could bring the nor'easter closer to the coast, which would put Vermont in play for some snow.
Right now, the betting is against a snowstorm. But, who knows? I might be singing a different tune by Wednesday.
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