Vermont's Damp, Chilly Start To May Is No Match For Past May New England Nightmares

Only the briefest breaks in the clouds yesterday as 
clouds billowed up to produce showers. 
Highs were only in the low 50s and chilly 
breezes made it worse. We face daily rain
chances tomorrow through next weekend. 

 We've gotten ourselves into a weather pattern share in New England in which clouds predominant and rain is an almost constant threat. 

But if you're slightly depressed about the weather, it can get a lot worse this time of year. More on that in a minute. 

We're only into the third day of May, and it hasn't been all that bad yet. Sure, yesterday was sort of unpleasant, with clouds, chilly breezes and on and off light showers. 

The next couple of days don't look terrible. But rain is coming back, and after a brief warm up, chilly weather and rain will be back. 

DETAILS

Today:

The only day in the near future I see without a rain threat seems to be today.  Morning clouds should dissolve into at least a partly sunny day. Highs should get into the 50s, which is a little cool for this time of year. 

Monday

A weak warm front tomorrow morning might set off a few light showers, mostly north and west. The rest of the day looks pretty good again under partly sunny skies and highs in the seasonable low 60s. Southwest breezes might occasionally help keep the black flies at bay. They're terrible this year! But I guess the black flies are horrendous every spring. 

Tuesday

A warmer and eventually wetter day.  The southwest breezes should continue and highs should rise into the low 70s. We also having a rising chance of showers and thunderstorms in the afternoon. I'm not sure yet whether any of thunderstorms will become strong, but the chances of a lot of severe thunderstorms is looking quite low.

Wednesday 

A slow moving cold front will keep us rainy and much cooler again. Highs should stay in the 50s.  This could change but rainfall totals Tuesday night to Wednesday night look like they might be a decent half inch to an inch. Nothing incredible, but we actually need the rain, so we'll take what we can get. 

Thursday and Beyond

Starting Thursday and continuing for perhaps several days, we're back to annoying weather. We probably won't have much rain Thursday and next weekend. Unless a nor'easter type storm comes closer to Vermont than we now think it will. 

But there will be an ever-present chance of showers, we will probably have a fair amount of clouds and temperatures will definitely be cooler than average for this time of year. 

IT COULD BE WORSE

The unsettled weather pattern has be thinking about past bouts of bad May weather. Just because I like to prove that if you're a little peeved about the weather, it could definitely be worse. 

1917

The coldest May on record. Only two days that month were warmer than 63 degrees. Nowadays, at least, in our climate changed world, normal May highs in Burlington range from 64 degrees on the 1st to 74 degrees on the 31st. 

The coldest it got that month was 32 degrees, which actually isn't that bad for May, but 18 mornings were in the 30s.  On eight days in May, 1917, temperatures in Burlington never got out of the 40s. 

1966

It's a tight battle, but my vote for the worst May on record in the past several decades is 1966. There were  series of bad Mays in the 1960s - cold, frosty, sometime snowy. But 1966 is probably the most miserable. Especially the first half. 

In Burlington, each morning from the May 1 through 15, 1966 were in the 20s and 30s. Eleven of those mornings were below freezing. That includes a low of 24 degrees on May 3, still the coldest temperature on record for May. It was 15 degrees in West Burke, 18 in Bloomfield and Chelsea and 19 in Cavendish, according to the Vermont Weather Book. 

On May 9, Burlington had 3.5 inches of snow, which is still the city's largest May snowstorm on record. Peru, Vermont had 11 inches of snow that day,  Newport had 5.2 inches. 

The second half of May, 1966 was better, with four days actually making it into the low 80s. 

1997

The most depressing May that I can remember clearly was in 1997.  There really weren't any temperature extremes, but we could just not get a warm day.  The temperature never got past 70 degrees until the 28th. May, 1997 is still the 10th coldest on record, 

 I remember the trees not fully leafing out until we got into June that year. Spring, 1997 was especially depressing because April was quite cold, too, 

2013

May, 2013 was actually pretty nice until we got toward the end of the month. Burlington had more than an inch of rain on four consecutive days on May 22-25.  May 21 came close to making it five days with 0.96 inches. I don't think there's any wetter stretch of weather than that on record. A whopping 7.39 inches of rain fell within six days.

The month's total was 8.74 inches, making it the wettest May on record. 

The first part of this wet spell was warm, with torrential thunderstorms. Those storms caused some damaging flash flooding in eastern Chittenden and Lamoille County, Vermont. 

A cold front passed and stalled to the east of Vermont, causing heavy snow in the mountains. Three feet of snow covered the summit of Whiteface Mountain in New York. The summit of Mount Mansfield had 13.2 inches, the latest in the season the mountain has gotten a foot of snow.

Nothing extreme like that is in the forecast for now. I guess we're blessed this May looks like it will just turn out mediocre.