Cool Saturday Morning, Unsettled Vermont Weather Week Coming Up

Some showers tried to get going in northern Vermont
Friday morning as a cold front arrived, but they never
really did amount to much. View here is a section of
Route 105 between St. Albans and Sheldon. 

Yesterday's cold front brought only sprinkles for most people. A few isolated areas got a quick shower, but the dry weather continues. We need the rain but for most of us, that's not coming for awhile. 

Meanwhile I Got up this morning and I actually felt, chilly. Autumn air was streaming though the open window. Where's my fleece?

I'm not complaining about a cool comfortable morning, not at all. But it is yet another sign of an autumn looming. 

TODAY

Burlington, Vermont had its coolest morning since June 9 this morning, but it wasn't all that cool in the grand scheme of things. It got down to 50 degrees at last check. We missed the record low for the date by a full nine degrees. So this wasn't exactly unusual.  

Most other Vermont towns were in the mid and upper 40s at dawn. Perennial cold spot Saranac Lake, New York appears to have gotten down to 36 degrees. All this sets the stage for a gorgeous day, as we've been advertising for days. 

As expected, there were plenty of foggy spots in the mountain valley early this morning. Those were starting to clear up as I wrote this at around 7:30 this morning. 

We are still in for a gorgeous day today. Sunshine will mix with some clouds. There was a patch of clouds over the northern Champlain Valley early this morning, but that should dissipate.

By afternoon, most of the scattered puffy clouds will be over the hills and mountains while broad valleys will be sunnier. The sunshine should boost temperatures into the  70s

Today will be the pick of the weekend. Though tomorrow will be OK, too.

SUNDAY 

The day will start with sunshine, but some clouds will work in, especially north. That's because a weak cold front will come at us from Quebec. A few scattered showers and maybe even a rumble of thunder could develop in the afternoon and evening, probably mostly north of Route 2.  

The best chance of showers are over the northern Green Mountains.  Not everyone will get wet, so chances are you can eke out your outdoor plans. 

Highs statewide should reach well into the 70s again, so it'll be comfortable again. 

The showers will work southward Sunday night, but will be widely scattered. 

MONDAY/ TUESDAY

The cold front will have gotten south of Vermont by Monday, but should stall not too far away from us. We'll get another nice day Monday as high pressure noses in from Quebec. It'll stay vaguely cool, with  highs in the 70s and lows Monday night within a few degrees either side of 50.

That old cold front will start to work north as a warm front Tuesday, so I think we might see some increasing clouds. That said, we still have conflicting forecasts on whether rain will sweep through during the day, or will it hold off until later? Stay tuned. 

WEDNESDAY/THURSDAY

As I noted yesterday, at least parts of Vermont are seeing a developing drought. We could use some rain for sure. Forecasts now call for a decent rainfall. Though I'm not promising it. Too often, when a lot of rain is expected three or four or five days from now, it all dries up before it gets to us, and in the end, we get little precipitation.

But for now, a storm looks like a storm coming in will drive that warm front into Vermont, and then a cold front would quickly follow. That would give us a decent batch of rain. 

We can only hope. 

This weather pattern looks like it could bring another round of severe weather for parts of the Northeast. There's been so many outbreaks of such weather this summer, For now, it looks like the severe weather might pass south of Vermont. But we'll need to watch this weather pattern, in case the trouble sneaks north. 

 

 

The weather pattern will feature channeled flow against
a deep layer high in the southeastern US and a strong, compact upper
low shifting slowly eastward across Canada. Systems with Pacific
origins will get sucked into this fast flow bringing rounds of rain.
Surface high pressure in far eastern Canada will try and keep warm,
humid air from lifting northeastwards, and so we will be on the
stable and dry side of things for the most part on Tuesday. We still
should observe increased clouds and some rain along the southern
portions of our forecast area. A stronger area of low pressure will
develop over the Great Lakes region on Wednesday, and that should
provide the focus for more active weather conditions. The interface
of dry, stable conditions on the western periphery of departing high
pressure and humid, modified tropical Pacific air will create the
potential for showers and thunderstorms beginning late Wednesday
afternoon. Elevated instability could allow thunderstorm activity to
persist overnight before the system departs early Thursday morning.
Synoptic scale models are starting to depict this feature as the one
that produces most of our rainfall next week. Dynamically, the
system appears quite vigorous and simulated IR satellite off the GFS
is showing the potential for cool cloud tops associated with the
elevated convection and strong isentropic lift. We`ll continue to
keep an eye on this feature.