Hot Vermont Day Led To Wild Night; Heat Is Back In Force Today

Lightning detector map from 10:15 last evening. 
White spots are new lightning strikes, red are older
The first line of storms is visible in eastern Vermont
and New Hampshire, with the second line in New York
Note that bright white area in northeast New York
That's the storm that gave the strobe light 
lightning show to northwest Vermont after 10 last night. 

First it was the heat, then the storms. 

It did get into them 90s for most of the area yesterday, but the heat underperformed slightly. We'll take anything we can get. For instance, Burlington got to 93, compared to a forecast high of 96

Then came the storms, which over-performed. 

Storms 

Things got wild in the late afternoon and evening. Severe storms approached from New York in the late afternoon, but faded right before they got to Vermont. Phew!

Not so fast. Storms exploded over the Champlain Valley and almost immediately become severe. That line of severe storms passed across all of northern and central Vermont, leaving a trail of damaged trees and power lines behind.  

The damage continued all the way east into New Hampshire. Here in the Green Mountain State, it  looks like Underhill/Cambridge was one of the hardest hit areas, with oodles of trees knocked down. Westford and Essex were also hard hit. 

Radar imagery showed what appeared to be 70 mph winds in the area.

But we were not done yet, nosiree! Another line of severe storms developed in New York and this one did not fade away.  There wasn't nearly as much damage this time, but what a light show! A storm that plowed into northwest Vermont between Burlington and St. Albans was basically a strobe light show, the lightning was so frequent. An early Fourth of July present from Ma Nature, apparently. 

The heat

We're only up to July 2, and we've already had five days this year that were at least 90 with more on the way as measured in Burlington 

Roughly half (60 of the past 127 years) have had fewer 90 degree days in an entire summer than what we've experienced so far this year.  It looks like we have at least two more 90 degree days coming up. 

Today will be the worst, with Friday a close second.

TODAY

The National Weather Service is back to forecasting a 100 degrees, which would only be the fifth time it  has gotten that hot in Burlington. Worse, with the humidity, the heat index could go as high as - gasp - 114 degrees. If that happens, it would be the worst heat index on record in Burlington, though those records only go back to 1947.

Needless to say, the extreme heat warning is still in effect across the Champlain and lower Connecticut River valleys and the lowlands of southwest Vermont. Elsewhere, the heat advisory for a "feels like" temperature of 100 to 105 is expected. 

Although thunderstorm chances are still there, those chances are a little lower than they were yesterday. But, with this extreme heat and humidity, they could pop up at any time and become strong. Today, the best chances of storms - severe or not - are closer to the Canadian border. But they could happen anywhere. 

FRIDAY

After another very stuffy night that won't give us much relief from the heat, temperatures will soar again. Hotter banana belt valleys, i.e. Champlain and Lower Connecticut, would probably make it into the mid 90s. Elsewhere, low 90s should do it most other places with the heat warnings and advisories still in place.

There's another chance of scattered storms in the afternoon and evening. Most of us won't get wet, but some of us will.

FRIDAY NIGHT/SATURDAY

A slightly better chance of storms and showers Friday night and Saturday morning as the poorest excuse for a cold front I've ever seen comes into the picture. Highs should "only" be within a few degrees either side of 90 on Saturday. 

SUNDAY AND BEYOND

Allegedly cooler, but you'll barely notice. Daily highs Sunday through Wednesday look to be well up in the 80s to near 90.  Lows will be in the 60s, so pretty stuffy nights will continue. 

If you've been keeping an eye out on your elderly neighbors, relatives and friends, you'll need to keep doing that next week. The effects of heat are cumulative. If people manage to get through today, tomorrow and Saturday, they still face elevated temperatures during the first half of the week.  Their systems will have been weakened by the intense heat, so relatively hot weather will still matter.

 

Late Wednesday Afternoon Update: Severe Storm Watch Western Vermont Until 11 PM; Heat To Intensify Tomorrow

National Weather Service radar showed severe storms
near Massena, New York at 5:45 p.m today. More storms
were lurking in the general area of Ottawa, If those
storms hold together or new ones form, they could
create damaging winds. A severe thunderstorm watch
is in effect for western Vermont until 11 pm 

 A severe thunderstorm watch is now in effect for western Vermont and New York until 11 pm, tonight. 

In Vermont, the watch covers basically everywhere west of the Green Mountains.

There's been a nasty cluster of storms in southeast Ontario and extreme southwest Quebec much of this afternoon. 

By late afternoon, they were starting to move east and southeast. It's unclear how far east they'll make it. But there's enough of a threat to trigger the storm watch. 

As of 5:30 p.m., it looks dark looking northwest from Vermont's Champlain Valley. That didn't represent an immediate threat. It was the anvil top and shadow of the severe storms near Massena, New York that were making things darker.  However, in this hot, humid environments, storms could form under this anvil, and become severe. If they don't, the anvil will just produce at most light rain. 

The storms near and approaching New York's St. Lawrence Valley could eventually make it to the Champlain Valley with powerful winds later this evening. Not a guarantee yet, but keep your eyes out!  

Judging from satellite photos, it loos storm well up into Ontario,  which is where the storms ar coming from So it could be a rather stormy night here in Vermont if they hold together. 

The heat today didn't quite make it to forecast levels, at least in the Champlain Valley. Preliminary data indicates Burlington made it to 93 degrees, which was three degrees cooler than forecast. 

That doesn't necessarily mean tomorrow will be cooler than forecast. But I did notice the National Weather Service back away slightly from that previous forecast of 100 degrees. 

Have a way to get weather warnings this evening and tonight, just in case. You might want to turn off your "Do Not Disturb" feature on your phone so you can get warnings if they are issued overnight. 

Stay cool, my friends! 

Vermont June In Vermont Was Wet And Warm, Stormy And Sunny

The highlight of Vermont's warm, wet June was a pair
of tornadoes that hit the state on June 18. This is a
photo of tree damage in Woodstock from 
one of the tornadoes, 

The numbers are in for what the climate was like in June, and as you'd expect, almost all of us experienced  a warm and wet June. 

In Burlington it was both the 15th warmest and 15th wettest June out of the past 135 years or so. The actual mean temperature in Burlington for June was 69.1 degrees.

That came in at only 1.6 degrees above normal, which you'd think wouldn't qualify the month at being 15th warmest.  But, as I remind you practically every month, this is the "new normal." It's based on the average of 1990 to 2020 when climate change had already made things around here warmer than the 20th century average. 

I imagine in several decades, the month we just had would be considered chilly 

The pattern in Burlington was repeated across the state, except the extreme southwest, where average temperatures for June, 2026 were close to average. 

However, most other weather stations that I checked were roughly between one and two degrees warmer than average.

Much of the state was wet, too. Burlington's 5.56 inches was 1.4 inches above average. As we get into the summer months, precipitation around the state gets much more variable. And so it was in June. Montpelier June total was 4.26 inches, just a few hundredths of an inch above normal.

It was both a pleasant month, as we got our fair share of sunny, comfortable days. But it was also stormy.  The highlight were the two tornadoes that hit Vermont on June 18. One was in a remote part of Lincoln, but the other was in a fairly busy spot along Route 4 in Woodstock. Given that the Woodstock tornado had wind speeds up to 100 mph, it's a very pleasant surprise that motorists along Route 4 or in nearby buildings weren't hurt. 

Other events included a supercell that caused damage in northwest and central Rutland County on June 26.

Also, on June 11, some flash flooding with road damage was reported in Hardwick and Wolcott.

For July, we already know it's starting out wicked hot, so it seems chances are it will be a hot July. NOAA is leaning just slightly toward giving us a warmer than normal July here in Vermont. If that's right, maybe soe cool weather late in the month will offset the current terrible heat. It's worth dreaming. 

NOAA also is slightly leaning toward a wetter than average July. We shall see!

Potentially Historic Vermont Heat Wave Now Underway. But We Escaped Severe Weather - So Far

Since it's so hot, let's do winter scenes. This is in
Burlington, Vermont's Intervale in December, 2023

Well, the bright side is Vermont missed out on the severe thunderstorms last night. We were worried some intense storms would roll down on us from Ontario and Quebec. They missed Vermont and went mostly through central New York yesterday and last night. 

They just missed the southwest corner of Vermont. Instead, we got a few non-severe showers and storms. 

But, I'm burying the lede of course. The hot weather is here, and it could be historic. (No. "lede" is not spelled incorrectly. It's journalism speak for the first sentence of an article). 

And that first sentence is hot. Burlington is now forecast to reach 100 degrees tomorrow. If that happens, it will only be the fifth time since the late 1800s that has happened. 

The clouds and showers yesterday held temperatures down. The humidity certainly soared, but the relatively coolness of last evening means we haven't really felt the effects of the heat. 

Until this morning. Temperatures are rocketing up and it should be miserable by afternoon. Here's the usual daily forecast rundown for this very unusual hot weather

TODAY

We start the day with a lot of sun, so now the the heat dome is in place, temperatures should rocket up. The National Weather Service in South Burlington is going for a high of 96 in Burlington today, which would tie the record set in 1911 and 2018.

It'll be in the 90s pretty much everywhere in Vermont today. That extreme heat warning stays in effect through Friday evening for the Champlain Valley, lowlands of southwest Vermont and the lower Connecticut River Valley. Those areas can expect heat indexes today, tomorrow and Friday to reach 105 degrees or even a little more. 

The rest of Vermont is under a heat advisory. That's because those areas might not quite meet the criteria  for an extreme heat warning as the heat index there would be a little under 105 degrees.

It doesn't really matter whether you're under an extreme heat warning or a heat advisory. It'll be very dangerous to do physical work outside today. And now's the time to start keeping tabs on heat-vulnerable people to make sure they're OK. 

The tired saying, "It's not the heat, it's the humidity" is partially true. It's the heat and the humidity. The dew point, a measure of how humid it feels, should be in the mid-70s in much of Vermont today. That's incredibly muggy and about as steamy as it could possibly get in Vermont. 

The next question is thunderstorms. I did see more of them lurking way up to the northwest of Montreal this morning. Those could come down and cause some trouble today. The heat and humidity could also cause sudden pop up storms around Vermont. I already saw a couple little ones appear out of nowhere a little after 8 a.m. today in northern New York. 

The glimmer of good news is if any form by afternoon, they might keep temperatures from rising quite as high as the forecasts indicate. 

The bad news is with all this heat and humidity around, something that starts as a small shower could blossom into a big, bad thunderstorm with damaging winds and torrential downpours almost within minutes. 

Keep your eye to the sky today, hopefully through a window in an air conditioned building. By the way, during heat waves like this, the threat of strong storms overnight doesn't go away like it usually does.  Big bad storms will be less likely tonight, but still possible. 

TOMORROW

The heat peaks. As noted, the National Weather Service is going for a high of 100 in Burlington tomorrow. The all time record high in Burlington is 101 degrees on August 11, 1944. It's been 100 degrees on July 3, 1911, June 19, 1995 and July 14, 1995. (Yeah, 1995 was a damn hot summer).

The all time hottest temperature in Vermont is an oldie, 105 degrees in Vernon, July 4, 1911.  I've been thinking that record is vulnerable in this age of climate change. I think a new statewide record will be established within the next few years. I don't think this heat wave will be the one to do it, but you never know. 

Still, the fact that tomorrow might well be Vermont's hottest day in 31 years is pretty impressive. 

Since the extreme heat and humidity will still be around, we do have to watch the possibility of strong or severe thunderstorms again. Like today, they will be hit and miss, but if you get hit by one, you'll know it. 

FRIDAY

It turns colder! The expected high in Burlington is 96 degrees. Yeah, still miserable. It'll get into the 90s across almost all the state again and the humidity will remain ridiculous. The effects of heat waves are cumulative We'll be in the third day of it by Friday, so those who are vulnerable to the heat will be really suffering by then .

If you know anyone without air conditioning who is elderly or has health problems, for gawd's sake check on them. And continue to "kidnap" them and bring them to fun, but air conditioned places. 

WEEKEND/NEXT WEEK

The heat wave ends, sort of, with a whimper. Starting Saturday or Sunday and continuing through the first half of next week afternoon highs will stop reaching the 90s and instead get well into the 80s. Overnight lows will be in the 60s. It will still be kind of humid. 

Since we all will have gone through a big, big heat wave, the moderately hot and fairly humid air will still have an effect on us. Continue making sure people are OK, because even typical summer weather can cause trouble after an intense heat wave 

As far as rain and storms go, forecasts beyond Saturday are all over the place, so flip a coin or something. We'll know more as we get closer to the weekend and next week.