Northeast Storm Update: Some Beneficial Rains Continue, Some Areas Surprisingly Snowy.

A little light rain falls on a very low Lake Champlain 
Thursday at St. Albans, Bay, Vermont. The lake is
very low due to our long, arid autumn.

 Needed precipitation was still falling in the Northeastern U.S, including here in Vermont, early today where modest, but still beneficial amounts of rain had fallen. 

Overall, the only surprising thing about this storm so far is how much snow is falling in some areas - again, just not here in Vermont. 

Though a little bit of the white is coming to the Green Mountain State soon.  More on that in a minute.

Snow fell Thursday as far west as Chicago, where 2.9 inches snarled traffic as this was the first substantial snowfall of their winter season.

A bonafide, pretty substantial winter snowstorm is  hitting parts of northeast Pennsylvania, especially the Poconos, southwestern New York and the Catskills in that state.

The core of the storm's coldest air has been in that region, which is why they're getting so much snow. The highest elevations of the Poconos can expect up to 16 inches of snow by the time this is done. It's been snowing there since yesterday. 

The higher peaks in the Catskills might see six to 12 inches by late tonight. 

Already, Leondardsville and Coventry, New York, in high spots northeast of Binghamton have reported 11 inches of new snow. Tomkinsville, Pennsylvania in the Poconos has gotten 10 inches. And it was still snowing there early this morning.  

It's even gotten into New Jersey. You might have heard about the long lasting, big wildfire on the northwest New Jersey/southwest New York border that had been burning for two weeks could see one to four inches of snow. 

Vermont ski areas can only look longingly at that snow. But the good news is, they'll finally get at least a little.

VERMONT UPDATE

As expected, round one of this storm dumped some decent rains in southern Vermont but not a whole lot in the north. The Northeast Kingdom was especially dry. For example, through early this morning, I don't think it even rained up in Newport, and if it did, it was only a few hundreds of an inch. 

As of a couple hours before dawn, Montpelier managed to pick up 0.21 inches, and Burlington 0.3 inches. Southern Vermont had between a half and two thirds of an inch. 

The map you'll see frequently in the coming months: The
National Weather Service snowfall prediction map.
This one, issued early this morning, shows much of
Vermont getting a bit of snow this weekend, but
any real accumulations would be limited to
high elevations. Click on the map to make it
bigger and easier to see.

If forecasts for the next 48 hours come true, another half inch of rain and/or melted snow is on the way. And yes, I said snow. But don't expect a huge powder day just yet. 

Patches of light rain were still moving east to west across Vermont early this morning. Some of that light rain is finally reaching the Northeast Kingdom.

But that should taper off for everybody in the Green Mountain State this afternoon as an area of dry air gets caught up in the Northeast U.S. storminess and passes through. 

This afternoon could actually be fairly nice, with breaks of sun and temperatures sneaking up to near 50 in the warmer valleys.  We should still have a breezy east wind, though.

Round 2

We're still expected Round 2 in the precipitation overnight and early Saturday and the forecast has actually trended a bit snowier. Most of us aren't in for a winter wonderland just yet, but many of us could see a coating of snow on the ground by Saturday morning. 

As I noted yesterday, a second storm will form well offshore of New England and the curl northwestward into the Gulf of Maine.

That will throw more precipitation westward into Vermont later tonight. There's still question marks as to how much rain and/or snow we we'll see, but the early guess is very roughly a half inch of precipitation, give or take.

Colder air should move in aloft, changing the rain to snow late tonight and early Saturday in many spots. Chances are some wet snowflakes will make it all the way down into the Champlain Valley. 

A lot of places at or above perhaps 800 feet in elevation have a decent shot of seeing a slushy coating to an inch or two. Mountain summits could see a few inches. Beware if you're planning on driving through higher elevations late tonight and early Saturday. Things could get slick in spots. 

As the storminess pulls away Saturday afternoon, we transition into class late November blustery weather 

That means plenty of rain and snow showers, through the rest of the weekend, especially in the mountains and western slopes. Additional snow accumulation will be slim to none in the valleys, but the ski areas could pick up a few inches.  Cold northwest winds could gust past 30 mph both Saturday and Sunday.

A weaker storm should spread some more light rain across the region later Monday into Tuesday. 

Then, winter hits.  By Wednesday and beyond, we'll see daily high temperatures barely making it past the freezing mark in the valleys and staying subfreezing in the mountains. There's uncertain signs of some accumulating snow later in the upcoming week, but we don't know for sure whether that will happen or not. 

 But chances are better than even that if any precipitation comes into Vermont after next Wednesday and  for many days afterward, that precipitation would probably be snow. 

Stalling Hurricanes Are A Rising Concern In The Age Of Climate Change

Hurricane Harvey caused extreme flooding in 2017
when it stalled around eastern Texas. Research indicates
hurricanes and tropical storms are stalling more
frequently, causing worse flooding. 

 To be Captain Obvious here, any town or city struck by a hurricane gets a rough ride. 

The destructive winds, the storm surges that batter everything to death along the coast, and the inches and inches of rain that create instantaneous floods are to say the least, scary and depressing. 

If you can find any good news in these awful scenarios, hurricanes more often than not move right along. 

They'll batter coastal communities for maybe 12 hours before moving on to wreck somebody else's life either further up the coast or somewhere inland. 

Here's a problem, though. Hurricanes are becoming less likely to be "hurrycanes" if you will. 

Sure, the two most recent big destructive hurricanes -Helene and Milton - cruised along at a fast forward speed. And both caused horrible deaths, damage and suffering. But researchers are becoming increasingly wary of what seems to be a rising trend in slow movers.

As the Washington Post reported last month:

"That is raising threats that even weaker storms, the kind hardy residents might shrug off, could unleash outsize impacts as they batter communities with uninterrupted downpours and unrelenting winds. 

The finds add to proof that human- caused global warming is intensifying rainfall and encouraging hurricanes to rapidly strengthen, revealing yet another sign of storms' increasing potential for destruction."

Researchers who have been looking into these sloth like storms, needing parameters, defined stalled hurricanes or tropical storms as those that stay within 250 square miles for at least 72 hours. 

 Between 1966 and 2022, the frequency of stalled storms rose at a rate of 1.5 percent each year. The stalling seems to occur most often in the Bay of Campeche, the central Gulf of Mexico, the western Caribbean, near Florida and near the Carolinas

 These stalled storms can happen anytime during hurricane season, but seem to be most common in September and October. The oceans supporting the storms are warm, and steering patterns are often weak in the tropics that time of year, so things tend to get sluggish, making these storms prone to stalling

The Washington Post notes that the new research is in line with previous work on the subject.

A 2018 study said the forward speed of Atlantic tropical cyclones decreased by 10 percent between 1949 and 2016. Polar regions are warming faster than the tropics, and this change tends to slow circulation patterns, so hurricanes and tropical storms don't get a push to move along. 

In the United States, tropical storm stalls are most likely near Texas and Louisiana, the western coast of Florida (the fast forward speed of Helene and Milton notwithstanding) and near the northeastern Florida/Georgia and Carolina coasts. 

There's plenty of examples of nearly stalled extreme havoc in recent years. Hurricane Harvey is perhaps the most famous example. It stalled over east Texas for days in August, 2017, dumping more than 50 inches of rain in some spots and causing the the worst flood in metro Houston history. 

Other stallers include Category 5 Hurricane Dorian, which stalled near Great Abaco, the Bahamas, blasting the island with catastrophic winds, which maintained hurricane force winds for 24 hours an d at least tropical storm force for three days.  Hurricane Florence stalled in the eastern Carolinas for days in 2018, producing a catastrophic flood there. Nearly three feet of rain fell in some spots.

Just last week, Tropical Storm Sara stalled near Honduras, dumping up to 40 inches of rain and causing intense flooding. 

The recent research didn't get into why more tropical storms and hurricanes are stalling. They often stall near coastlines, so maybe it has something to do with differences in temperature between land and sea in those locations.  Also, polar regions are warming faster than mid-latitudes, and that might have something to do with it. 

The study does suggest emergency managers who deal with hurricanes might want to factor in what to do if a hurricane stalls nearby.  

Separate research also says climate change is making hurricane wind speeds higher. So the news is basically all bad. I'll have a separate post on those hurricane wind studies in an upcoming post. 

Did Northeast Drought Peak This Week? Updated Weekly Update Sets A Severity Baseline

The only part of the Northeast now escaping abnormally dry
or drought conditions is the Champlain Valley of 
Vermont and New York. 

 We've been doing regular updates as the weekly U.S. Drought Monitor arrives, and we're hoping this week shows the peak of the drought in the Northeast.  

The data in the latest report, which came out this morning, shows data through Tuesday, before a badly needed rainstorm arrived in the Northeast. 

 This rain won't even nearly end the drought, but we'll see in about a week if the precipitation put a dent in the problem. 

So, that's why I'm hoping the peak was this week. We don't want it to get worse. 

Thursday's report shows about virtually all of the Northeast from West Virginia to Maine is at least abnormally dry if not in drought. (The figure is 97 percent of the region).

  Somehow, only the Champlain Valley of New York and Vermont is considering at least just shy of being abnormally dry. 

The percentage land area in the Northeast which is in drought is now 61.4 percent, up a little more than three percentage points over the previous week. 

VERMONT

Here in the Green Mountain State, today's drought report shows little change from the previous week. As mentioned, only the Champlain Valley is free of officially dry conditions or drought concern. Southern Vermont - about a quarter of the state, is in drought. A small area in the extreme south is in severe drought.  

The drought in Vermont had been rapidly worsening week to week, so it was nice to see the downward trend slow to a crawl this week. That managed to happen even though less than a tenth of an inch of rain fell in northern Vermont and most places in the southern part of the state has nothing at all.

Vermont's drought isn't as bad as it is points south, so the rain that started today should help noticeably. It will fall well short of erasing drought and dry conditions, but it should make at least a little difference. 

Glorious Rain (And Snow!) Now Drenching Parched Northeast, Parts Of Vermont Might Wait A Bit For Drenching

Red sky in the morning sailors take warning, goes the
saying. Pink sky in the morning, like we saw in 
St. Albans, Vermont this morning, I guess heralds
some upcoming beneficial rain. 

 It's been raining much of the night and early this morning in places like Pennsylvania, New Jersey and southern New York. 

That would normally be not news at all, except that it's been so dry for so long there, that it is very noteworthy. 

As of 7 a.m. Philadelphia has reported 0.84 inches of rain. An unremarkable amount of a late November storm. 

But amazingly that's more rain than what's fallen this year in Philly between September 8 and November 19. (Normal rainfall during that period should have been roughly eight inches).

So the anticipated and hoped for  rains have arrived, the wildfires in the Northeast are being squelched as expected, but the drought is far from over. 

The weekly national drought update comes out later today, so I'll put together a new post about that later today. 

The Mid-Atlantic States will only get modest amounts of additional rain from this, but anything will help. 

Meanwhile, we in northern New England are in for a long period of rainy weather, with still some snow in the mountains.

VERMONT UPDATES 

 This is turning out to be kind of a weird storm system, which is causing some odd twists in the forecast.

An upper level low with a cold pool of air was over the Ohio Valley this morning. Meanwhile, a storm formed along the Mid-Atlantic coast, which made all that rain blossom yesterday and last night. 

The upper low is tugging this storm northwestward, which is a somewhat odd direction for an albeit fairly weak coastal low to head.

The combination of this path and the cold pool aloft will cause quite a snowstorm in the high elevations of the Pennsylvania Poconos, where a winter storm warning is up for later today and tonight.

Up here in Vermont, we're a ways from that upper level low so the atmosphere is warmer. That means when precipitation comes in, it will be mostly rain, with snow limited to the highest elevations.

Oddly, the best chance of high elevation snow is in southern Vermont, which is closer to that cold pool of air. 

The storm will come in two parts. The precipitation in Vermont will never come down super hard, but it will tend to add up over time. 

Part 1

The path of this initial storm means northeastern Vermont will probably initially get cheated out of much rain. 

Most of it today and tonight will be closer to that storm, focused generally south and west of Interstate 89. 

Thursday morning forecasts from the National Weather Service in South Burlington called for as much as 1.3 inches of rain in Manchester, Vermont by dawn Friday. Meanwhile, Newport and St. Johnsbury can only expect 0.1 to 0.2 inches during that period. 

As the first storm gets absorbed into the upper low in or near Ohio, we'll get a break from the rain Friday here in the Green Mountain State. A few showers might stick around, but there could even be a couple shafts of sun breaking through the clouds too. 

But it ain't over

Part 2

Remember that cold upper low I mentioned over Ohio? By the weekend, it will have moved to near the Mid-Atlantic coast.

A new storm will form offshore, and much like the first storm, it will get tugged northwestward by that upper level cold pool of air. This second storm will get nudged sort of toward Maine, which will allow rain to re-blossom over northern New England. 

This time, the best chances of decent rains would be over northern Vermont. That would help soak the Northeast Kingdom. So by Sunday morning, the National Weather Service estimates storm totals in southern Vermont will be up slightly to 1.5 inches. But in the Northeast Kingdom, total rainfall through Sunday would go to 0.75 to 1 inches, so pretty decent.

This second storm will be a bit colder than the first, so there's a better chance of some high elevation snow, But not much. We still don't have much cold air to work with. So you'd probably have to go way up to summit level by Sunday to see a decent dump. Down where all most of the ski slopes are, there might be a dusting to a few inches, but nothing earth-shattering. 

Beyond that, the weather pattern goes somewhat quieter again, with no big new storms on the immediate horizon next week. But a shifting pattern means pretty much the whole Lower 48 of the United States will probably be trending colder through the end of the month and into December.

That includes here in Vermont. So far, it looks like the coldest air might focus on the Rockies and Plains. But we would get chilly enough to see winter finally take hold around here, too. 

I'm Shocked That So Far, Forecasters Aren't Really Backing Off Of Northeast Soaker Forecast

Rainfall forecasts with the upcoming storm remain
encouragingly consistent. Heaviest rain is 
forecast for southern Vermont, where it's needed most.
Up to two inches south, less than an inch Northeast.

 This is increasingly looking like this will be "the one."  

By that I mean for once, the forecasts have remained steady.  There's very little change to the idea that the drought-stricken Northeast is about to get a nice soaking rain. 

It won't be nearly enough to erase the drought. Some areas would need a good ten inches of rain to do that, and we're only talking about an inch of rain, two at the very most with this one. 

But unlike past hoped-for rains this autumn, this one still looks like it's going to come to pass.

Frankly his takes some getting used to, talking about a noticeable storm headed our way. That hasn't happened in ages, it seems. Not that I'm complaining.

If there's any trends in the forecast, they're minor. Things have trended a little colder to the southwest of the storm track. To the point where a winter storm watch has been issued for northeastern Pennsylvania. Up to a foot of snow could come down in some high elevations of the Poconos.

But moisture is moisture. Snow would tamp down brush and wildfires at least as well as a soaking rain, right?

Folks from New Jersey to New Hampshire will be dancing in the rain as they watch the smoke from these fires dissipate under the rainy overcast tomorrow

VERMONT FORECAST

Up here in Vermont, the forecast for this storm has trended a wee bit warmer. That means only the highest elevations will see any real snow, at least the way it looks now. 

Tail end lighter precipitation Friday night through Sunday might pile up a few inches way up high, but the period of heaviest precipitation Thursday and Thursday night would be rain, unless maybe you're way up at 3,000 feet of elevation or higher. 

The heaviest rain looks like it will hit southern Vermont, which is great, because that's where it's currently the driest. 

Best guesses through Saturday morning brings about 1.25 to nearly two inches of rain for most areas south of Route 4.

The Champlain Valley looks like they're in for maybe an inch of rain.

The Northeast Kingdom is most likely to get cheated out of some of the rain. There's a lot of east winds with this system, especially when the best moisture arrives. When there's a steady, strong east wind with a storm system, New Hampshire's White Mountains often block a lot of the moisture from reaching places like St. Johnsbury, Lyndonville, Newport and Island Pond. 

So, those areas will probably see less than an inch of rain, with a few places possibly only clocking in with a half inch. Still, that helps. 

Winds shift into the northwest over the weekend. Usually a departing storm this time of year will bring snow showers even to the valleys. It shouldn't be hard to get below freezing in late November. 

Not this time. There's very little cold air to our north to tap into, so valleys should keep going with mostly cold rain showers, while the high elevations do get a little snow.  

The precipitation - valley showers and mountain snow shower - will gradually wane during the day Sunday. 

Beyond the weekend, the forecast still looks iffy. Unfortunately, it looks like it's trending a little less stormy than earlier predictions, so we might not get as much needed extra rain and snow as I first thought. 

But who knows? I'll keep an eye on it.  

First Major West Coast Atmosphere River Getting Their Wet Season Off To A Doozy Of A Start

We've entered the season in which pretty big storms come off the Pacific Ocean and hit various parts of the West Coast, sometimes intensely, sometimes not.  

Satellite view shows the strong "bomb" cyclone centered off
the Washington and British Columbia coast this afternoon.
It's the comma shaped thing on the right hand side of the 
image. Part of the atmospheric river is visible as that
long white streak heading west from the storm

The first major storm of the season looks like quite a doozy. What is known as a bomb cyclone will team up with an atmospheric river .

A bomb cyclone is a storm that's intensifying super fast. A storm is a center of lower air pressure. In general, the lower the air pressure in a storm, the stronger it is.

 Technically, if the air pressure in a storm drops by 24 millibars within 24 hours, the storm is a bomb. 

Bomb storms are often dangerous they are simply strong and getting stronger. You can plan on a lot of wind and precipitation if you're hit with a bomb cyclone, and that will be the case with this "bomb"

This storm could be the most intense in the region since at least the 1940s. 

 An atmospheric river is a long narrow corridor of deep moisture.  When one of these comes a shore, a 200 to 400 mile wide band,

So we have a strong storm and a stronger than usual atmospheric river. The result is a West Coast mess that started today. 

THE RESULT

Between this afternoon and Sunday evening, ten to as much as 15 inches of rain to northwestern California and southwestern Oregon. 

NOAA's Weather Prediction Center says that by Thursday, there's a high risk of dangerous flooding in parts of northwestern California. High risk flood alerts from NOAA happen only about four times a year and it's exceedingly rare for them to be issued three days before the event, as this one was.

High risk days account for two-fifths of all U.S flood deaths and at least 80 percent of all flood damage. So this is serious. 

Emergency managers are especially worried about mudslides and debris flows, especially on slopes that suffered wildfires in recent years.

The storm is accompanied by those high winds. Many neighborhoods are pretty heavily forested, which means trees could fall on houses. People are being warned to stay in interior rooms on the lowest floors of their homes because of this risk, 

Those winds tonight could gust to 70 mph, with possible 85 mph gusts near the beaches. 

Ten to as much as 20 inches of rain could
fall in the yellow shaded area of 
northwest California and southwest
Oregon over the next several days. 

The rough weather extends all the way to Washington and British Columbia. High winds are expected even in the big cities of Seattle, Tacoma and Vancouver, Canada. 

Blizzard warnings are up for Washington's Cascade mountains, 

Previous to this storm, some strong systems have hit British Columbia, and sideswiped Washington State with some decent rains. But points further south have had just small introductory systems to introduce the rainy season.  

This will be a real slap of reality and could be the start of a rough winter on the West Coast, especially roughly from San Francisco north.  There's a La Nina weather pattern, albeit a weak one, and that often cause extra storminess in the Pacific Northwest

WEST COAST STORM AND VERMONT

The West Coast storminess is unrelated to the super welcome precipitation that we're expecting starting Thursday. That one got energy from a previous storm that came ashore from the Pacific a few days ago. 

Despite the power of what's hitting the West this week, I so far see few signs of that storm spawning anything extreme in our neck of the woods.   

One piece of that atmosphere river should come through New England in about a week as a modest system with light precipitation. After that, the weather pattern seems like it could be active for us, but that's uncertain.  

UPDATE: Tropical Storm Sara Thankfully Dies, Leaves A Flooded Honduras Behind

Damage in Honduras from now-departed Tropical
Storm Sara, which dissipated this past weekend.

 Tropical Storm Sara, having tortured Honduras for several days with torrential rains and flooding, finally moved inland over Belize and the southern Yucatan Peninsula of Mexico over the weekend and died away. 

Good riddance

It left behind widespread flooding in Honduras, with reports of up to 40 inches of rain. So far, I'm grateful to report only two deaths, which seems surprisingly and happily low for a storm of this magnitude

At last check, reports from Honduras indicate 11 bridges, 226 homes and 252 streets and roadways destroyed.  More than 7600 people have been rescued.  

Some forecasts last week suggested Sara would re-emerge over the Gulf of Mexico, head east and becomc a threat to Florida.

The remnants of Sara might end up in Florida this week as a patch of briefly heavy rain, but that's about it. Nothng to worry about. 

One weird aspect of this is the remnants might ended up heading south to below Jamaica in the Caribbean, which is where this thing all started in the first place. But there's very little chance - if any - that the Sara remnants would regenerate.

Sara will probably - but not definitely - be the last tropical storm of the busy 2024 season. The Atlantic hurricane season ends on November 30, though a few tropical and subtropical storms and even hurricanes have been known to form in December.

However, the National Hurricane Center as of this morning is forecasting no tropical storm development for at least the next seven days.