Frigid Weather Drags On; Lakes Freezing Up

Screen grab from the WCAX Echo Center web cam from
this morning. There's a lot of ice on Lake Champlain now.
If you look carefully you can still see open water far offshore 

 It's frigid again today here in Vermont and through the rest of the eastern United States as the worst siege of winter weather in years, maybe decades rolls on with little sign of a break. 

A historic nor'easter and cold wave in the Southeast was just cranking up toward full speed this morning. 

Up here in Vermont, nothing exciting. Just unrelenting, tiring cold. 

LAKE CHAMPLAIN

Lake Champlain is rapidly freezing up. This week, the huge expanse of open water we saw at the start o the week is now a relatively small hole of open water way out in the middle. 

On Wednesday, the lake was pretty much frozen just to the Burlington breakwater, which is about 1,000 feet offshore. By Thursday, the ice went all the way out to Juniper Island, which is three miles offshore from Burlington.  

Shelburne Bay had some open water Wednesday. By Thursday the bay was entirely iced over. 

The cold weather yesterday and today obviously manufactured even more ice. Still, it will take awhile for the middle of the lake to freeze over because it's more exposed to the wind. Also, it's the deepest part of the lake, so relatively warmer water would upwell from below, which would at least delay a freeze over. 

WCAX noted that in all but one winter with a January weather like this year's the lake froze over completely if February's temperatures were below normal.

Spoiler: February's temperatures will be below normal as we see no real sign of a let up in the cold through the middle of the month. Sure, some days will be only a little cooler than average. But other days will be bitterly cold, at least as forecast look now.

It Lake Champlain entirely freezes over this winter, it would be the first time since 2019 that it's happened. The lake has only frozen over eight times since 2000. 

GREAT LAKES

The Great Lakes are freezing over, too, Lake Erie was 95 percent frozen as of yesterday. That will mostly shut down the lake effect snows in and south of Buffalo for the season. (Even when Lake Erie is frozen, some moisture gets through the ice, so there could still be some light lake effect in towns south Buffalo, like Dunkirk and Hamburg.

Lake Erie is much shallower than the other Great Lakes, which is why it freezes over so readily. 

Deep Lake Ontario had the least ice, but it was still 23 percent frozen over. About a quarter of both Lake Michigan and Lake Superior had iced over. A little more than half of Lake Huron was frozen.

The ice on those lakes will continue to expand, as no thaws are headed toward the Great Lakes. 

VERMONT FORECAST

No thaws are coming to Vermont, either. 

Oh sure, today will be hotter than yesterday. But not by much. The high temperature in Burlington yesterday was 7 degrees. The forecast high today is 12. After another subzero night tonight, Sunday's temperatures will be similar to today's 

Vermont is still set up for a "heat wave" this coming week. It now looks like every day for most places in the Green Mountain State should reach the low to mid 20s. Overnight lows will be within a few degrees either side of zero. That's just a little colder than average.

But signs point toward the deep chill returning by next weekend. Lo ng range forecast have us below zero again for at least a few days starting about a week from now.

Between now and next weekend, we'll have very little if any snow. Cold waves like this are dry, so it's hard to get any substantial snowfalls in this weather pattern.  

Oh, sure, we'll have some flurries from time to time, but it'll never amount to much. We had some flurries this morning. That was actually produced by moisture from all the way up in the Labrador Sea. The air flow has been coming from that direction overnight and this morning. 

Those flurries could continue here and there for the rest of the day.  

Back To Winter Here In Vermont. But It's Worse Elsewhere

Though remaining snow ended in most of Vermont 
overnight, light snow continued in parts of the 
Champlain Valley past dawn. This is a traffic cam
grab of Route 7 in Ferrisburgh at around 8 a.m today.

The cold air is back in Vermont.  It makes it feel like today's date is not January 16, but January 359. January always seems like by far the longest month of the year. 

In Burlington, yesterday was the last of nine consecutive days with above freezing high temperatures. I can guarantee it will stay below freezing today. 

During the transition to colder weather in Vermont yesterday afternoon, we ended up with some lingering trouble on the roads.  

The incoming cold air stalled out temporarily, and temperatures in most places east of the Champlain Valley stayed a bit above freezing until afternoon. In the Champlain Valley, a little freezing drizzle fell in the late morning before precipitation changed to light snow. 

The result of all this was some nasty Vermont roads for awhile. There were some crashes along Interstate 89 in the Bolton area. Another two vehicle crash was reported in Fairfax.

Since this is blessed Vermont, things once again were much worse elsewhere. That's almost always the case. 

Areas in the snow belt regions of the Great Lakes saw a rash of big highway pileups over the past couple of days. 

In New York, not far from Syracuse, at least 36 vehicles crashed into each other on Interstate 81, injuring at least seven people. Two big pileups occurred in Pennsylvania, one on Interstate 90 in Erie County and another on Interstate 80 in Clarion County. 

On Wednesday, at least thirty vehicles piled up on the Indiana Toll Road in Elkhart County on Wednesday amid heavy snow there. 

Up in Toronto, Canada, nine inches of snow snarled traffic and closed schools. 

 VERMONT FORECAST

Higher elevations did get cold enough for some snow overnight Wednesday and early Thursday, even as valleys remained above freezing and rainy. The most I saw was 4.7 in Craftsbury and 4.6 in South Albany.  Other mid-elevation locations had maybe two or three inches. Very little fell in most valleys. 

 More light snow broke out Thursday afternoon and night. This was light, fluffy stuff. At least it created a thin layer of fresh powder atop the old crust from previous, rain-soaked snows. 

 The additional snow yesterday afternoon and last night amounted to one to three inches in some areas of northern Vermont. Valleys in southern Vermont pretty much missed out. 

Here in St. Albans, Vermont, at my place, I received 1.1 inches of snow. A third of an inch of that was that crusty, schmutzy stuff from yesterday morning. The rest was feathery fluff that fell from late afternoon yesterday to early this morning. 

The snow overnight has been especially persistent in the Champlain Valley for some reason.  I bet some places in the central and southern Champlain Valley and adjacent Green Mountains to the east picked up at least two inches of fluff, judging from radar images. 

Judging from traffic cameras, most roads in Vermont didn't look too bad, though some in the southern Champlain Valley and through the Green Mountains had some snow on them. Likely icy patches, too.

We probably aren't going to see much snow going forward. At least for the next few days. The heavy stuff will be mostly limited to lake effect near the Great Lakes, the kind that contributed to those pileups in Pennsylvania and New York. 

As expected, it's cold this morning, with temperatures in the single numbers in most places. It'll stay cold today, with highs in the teens to near 20.

The chill should ease off over the weekend. It'll pop back up into the low 30s in the valleys Saturday and within a few degrees of 30 degrees on Sunday. 

While we're experiencing average January weather here on Sunday, it might actually snow a little in the Florida panhandle. If it does, it'll be the second January in a row with snow there. Though last year's snow was much bigger, epically breaking records. 

We'll always have a chance of some light snow and flurries all weekend. Most places will have an inch or less. However, the southern Green Mountains could pick up a few inches from the tail end of lake effect from the Great Lakes. 

BITTER COLD RETURNS

On Monday, it's beginning to look like a nor'easter will pass by New England, offshore. At this point it looks like it will have little, if any effect on Vermont. But we'll watch this, because if the storm tracks further west than expected, we could see some snow, especially south and east. 

That would be nice, as that part of Vermont has largely missed out of snow lately. 

The nor'easter is iffy, the forecast for frigid weather is not. The middle of next week will be brutal, with highs probably staying in the single number and low teens and lows below zero. Nothing even close to record breaking but still very noticeable. 

It'll stay cold late next week and beyond, but we're not yet sure how cold. Frigid air will lurk nearby for the rest of the month, and occasionally, ooze on in to send temperatures below zero again. 

The weather pattern will remain active, with several disturbances and storms in the mix later next week and beyond. It's way too soon to say which ones, if any will affect us. It's always possible one or more of these could give us a big dump of snow, but there's no way to determine that right now. 

 

Weird Northern Heat Wave, Wildfires Now Giving Way To Widespread Tornados/Severe Weather In The U.S.

After a sort of quiet first half of May in the severe weather
department, things ramp up in the nation starting today.
Areas in yellow and especially orange are at risk
for tornadoes and destructive storms today. 

No rest for the weary in the United States when it comes to active, dangerous weather.

The giant, bonkers, record shattering heat wave in the northern Plains, western Great Lakes and south central Canada is mercifully ending. 

Those giant forest fires in Minnesota that resulted from that arid, windy weather should get tamped down somewhat by much cooler weather and more than a half inch of rain expected today and tomorrow. 

But the price of that is steep. We're about to embark on about a week of tornadoes, destructive hailstorms, severe thunderstorms and flooding that will hit various parts of the nation. 

March and April had a near record number of tornadoes in the United States. As we entered the peak of the severe weather season in May, we were fortunate to get a sort of break, 

True, there were tornadoes and severe thunderstorms and brutal hailstorms so far this month, but there were no mega-outbreaks of tornadoes or multi-day strings of severe weather in the first half of May.

Still, we've had 758 tornadoes through May 13 compared to the average of 613 through that date. In the past 15 years, only 2011 and 2024 had had more tornadoes through mid-May in the United States.

Those relatively calm days of early May are over. Starting today, tornadoes, giant hail and destructive storms will be in the news for at least a week.

If Ma Nature plays her cards right, or more accurately, wrong, the tornado count for the season will get a big boost over the next few days. 

TODAY

The dangerous weather today will cover a broad area centered on the Great Lakes, and they'll hit populated areas, too. Cities most at risk for destructive thunderstorms and tornadoes today include Chicago, Milwaukee, Madison, Wisconsin and Fort Wayne, Indiana.

There's a chance that some tornadoes in or more likely near these cities could be strong and long lasting. In other words, the damage could be worse had a barn roof flying off and a couple trees toppling over. We'd better hope the stronger tornadoes remain over rural areas 

TOMORROW

The risk of tornadoes and severe weather on Friday is just as great as today, it's just shifted south to the Ohio Valley. Cities most at risk Friday include Indianapolis, Cincinnati, Nashville, Louisville and St. Louis. 

NEXT FEW DAYS

The weather traffic will be busy in the U.S. for the next few days with storms and disturbances moving generally west to east across the nation. These storms will feed on the contrast between record and near record heat in the far south and chilly air to the north, 

The tornado threat will shift depending the day,  but will focus mostly in traditional Tornado Alley -- the Plains states.  NOAA's Storm Prediction Center has a tornado threat in that general region daily Saturday through Tuesday.  

VERMONT EFFECTS

Once again, through all this rough national weather, we in the Green Mountain State will lead a charmed life.  But that doesn't mean conditions here will stay nice, We've got rain, thunderstorms, clouds, and eventually much chillier air coming in. 

There's even a low chance of severe storms and a little flooding through this,  But luckily, so far it looks like we're avoiding a calamity.

The sunny, warm weather we've had in Vermont this week is all but over. Though today won't be so bad, with a fair amount of sun mixed with the clouds and just a slight chance of a widely scattered afternoon or evening shower or thunderstorm. 

Starting today and continuing tomorrow, it will be a bit more humid than we're used to. Kind of like summer,

Friday will be a truly summery day with highs in many places getting into the low 80s and again, it will be on the humid side. Showers and thundershowers will develop in the afternoon and continue into the evening, They'll be much more numerous than they will be today, so most of us will get wet. 

Enjoy that summer warmth and humidity tomorrow, as that will be the last time you feel it for a long while. We're shifting into a cool, unsettled pattern that should last until at least toward the end of the month. 

And guess what? Saturday will be rainy, which will be the eighth wet Saturday in a row. It'll be the most interesting day of the week, too. NOAA's Storm Prediction Center has Vermont in a marginal risk for isolated severe storms. NOAA also has us in a marginal risk for excessive rain and flooding. 

Those are the lowest of the alert levels. If severe storms do develop, they will be isolated and short-live. Same is true if we see any flooding.  Any high water would be in just a handful of places and should be minor. At least as it looks now.  If there's updates to this, we of course will pass that along. 

Starting Sunday, daily highs in Vermont will only be in the 50s and 60s for the foreseeable future.

Alberta Clipper Makes Things Super Intense Near Great Lakes; Here In Vermont Part 2 Coming Later Today

Forecast for additional accumulation around Vermont
for this Alberta Clipper. More than six inches in
some of the mountains, but little in the Champlain Valley
Still, travel should get tricky again later today.

 I think we ought to start this post in Erie, Pennsylvania, which is taking the cake for some of the most intense lake effect scariness of this whole episode, that's lasted nearly a week now. 

Erie County, Pennsylvania, home to nearly a million people, has had three to four feet of snow since Friday. It's gotten to the point where buildings are starting to collapse.

 Interstate 90 through that region has been closed intermittently, and when it opens, it keeps becoming the scene of multi-vehicle pileups.

Now, today, Erie County is under a blizzard warning. Another 10 to 20 inches of snow is forecast from more lake effect snows. Winds could gust to 50 mph, or even 65 mph closer to the lake today. The National Weather Service says travel will become impossible today. 

There's concern more homes and buildings could collapse under the weight of the snow. Trial by snow indeed! 

A blizzard warning is also up for the mountains of West Virginia and the extreme western tip of Maryland, too.

Meanwhile other areas around the Great Lakes, including Michigan, Ohio, New York and Ontario up in Canada are also being blinded by lake effect squalls this morning. That state of affairs will continue all day. 

What a mess!

VERMONT EFFECTS:

Here in Vermont, things are much more reasonable than they are around the Great Lakes.

The first round of snow came through overnight as expected. Much of the Champlain Valley was "shadowed" by the Adirondacks. Moisture was captured by those mountains, so little snow fell in places like Burlington. 

For the first time this season, my yard in St. Albans, Vermont
looked truely wintry after a little more than two
inches of new snow last night. 

The far northern part of the Champlain Valley did escape that shadow, as I measured 2.4 inches of new snow at my place in St. Albans.

Also as expected, the snow picked up again in the Green Mountains, with mostly two or three inch reports so far. 

There was a lull in the activity this morning as some dry air has worked its way into our Alberta Clipper ahead of its cold front. 

 Most main roads toward the tail end of this morning's commute looked like they were in pretty good shape, according to traffic cameras set up around the state.

Temperatures should creep up to slightly above freezing in the broader valleys later this morning, which will help melt remaining slush of the highways. 

But Round 2 is coming.

The clipper's cold front will come through this afternoon with batches of snow showers, some of them locally heavy, dropping temperatures quickly below freezing. Winds will pick up, so there should be plenty of blowing snow later today and tonight, too

Today's evening commute is probably going to be on the tricky side in many areas.

Just like last night, the Champlain Valley probably won't see much additional snow. Many spots there should see less than an inch. But it doesn't take much snow to ice up the roads if temperatures are falling below freezing. Take your time headed home this evening. 

Elsewhere, a few inches of snow should pile up overnight, with a good six or more inches up at the ski areas on top of what has already fallen. It should be a noisy night, too with winds gusting to 40 mph in the valleys and more than that in the mountains.

On the bright side, it should be a great early season ski weekend before the warmer air inevitably arrives next week.

Bits of snow will fall Saturday and Sunday as weak disturbances slip through. It might get warm enough for rain drops in the Champlain Valley Sunday afternoon.

A modest, warm storm should give us mostly light rain Monday and Tuesday before the forecast gets questionable again.  We don't know whether a second storm will come up the East Coast Thursday or not. And if it does, we don't know yet whether enough cold air will blow in to give us snow instead of rain. 

So if you're looking ahead toward a week from now, keep guessing. We'll figure that out within a few days from now.  

Great Lakes, And Lake Champlain Remarkably Ice-Free

St. Albans Bay on Lake Champlain was entirely ice free on
January 4. While large areas of the lake are often ice-free
this early in the winter, shallow, sheltered areas like
this bay are usually frozen by early January. 

After the second warmest December on record in Vermont, there's precious little ice on Lake Champlain. And many other lakes in the Green Mountain State for the matter.  

Shallow parts of Lake Champlain are often frozen by now. I live not far from St. Albans Bay, which is quite often frozen by January 1, but as of Thursday, it was wide open.   `

Of course, the weather patterns could change, and the lake could freeze up very nicely later this month and in February. 

But there is a risk that this year could become another year in which ice fishing - a big tradition on Lake Champlain - could become unsafe like last year 

Three people died last February when they fell through thin Lake Champlain ice during a remarkably warm winter.  The 43rd annual Islands Ice Fishing Derby in mid-February was called off due to the unsafe ice. 

This year, even smaller lakes in Vermont were ice-free as 2024 dawned. People on Lake Champlain are also fretting. WPTZ interviewed Valerie Hunter, owner of Keeler's Bay Variety Store in South Hero. She said:

"It's really sad because it cuts down on a lot of things, a lot of recreation things. A lot of people ice skate on the lake, they play hockey on the lake, they do a lot of other things on the lake that they're not able to do."

I can't predict what will happen later this winter, but climate change is making it more likely that we'll see thin or even no ice on Vermont lakes. Lake Champlain has only entirely frozen over once since 2016, and then only for a brief time in March, 2019. (It came close to freezing over in 2022).

It's not just Lake Champlain. 

The Great Lakes started 2024 with remarkably little ice, reports the Washington Post:

"The Great Lakes had the smallest amount of ice cover this New Year's Day in a least the past 50 years and are on track to see less than the seasonal average this winter, according to government data. The decline comes during a five-decade drop in ice cover that experts say is due in part to human-caused climate change."

Like in Lake Champlain, there's a lot of year-to-year variability in ice cover. And the amount of ice cover can increase in a flash if intense cold waves invade the Great Lakes region later this winter. 

Unusual for this time of year: A couple and their dog
walk along an entirely ice free St. Albans Bay with
no snow on the ground on January 4, 2024. 

Still, the amount of ice on the Great Lakes was remarkably paltry as 2024 began.  

It's true the Great Lakes don't start freezing in earnest until January, but this is ridiculous. On Monday, only 0.35 percent of the Great Lakes were under ice, says the Washington Post. Normally, about 9 percent of those lakes are ice covered on New Year's Day. 

Recent years have been pretty lame with Great Lakes ice on January 1. Last year, they were 4 percent ice covered. The year before that, it was 2.35 percent. 

Great Lakes ice cover is important for several reasons. Ice prevents storms from stirring up large waves that can batter the shoreline.  Open water means a greater likelihood of lake effect snowstorms on days when cold winds blow over the water and gain moisture from the lakes.

Lack of ice  can hurt tourism, as a lot of people like to go ice fishing. On the other hand, open Great Lakes water helps the shipping industry. 

Although some of the Great Lakes like Huron, Erie and Superior have entirely frozen over in some years, the entirety of the Great Lakes has never completed become ice covered. 

On average, the maximum ice coverage of the Great Lakes is 53 percent. The coverage since the early 1970s has ranged from a peak of 95 percent coverage in the frigid winter of 1979 to a low of 12 percent in 2002.

In the thirteen years since 2000, only five years saw Great Lakes ice coverage exceed the long term average. 

Classic Great Lakes "Gale Of November" Setting Up; These Storms Have Quite A History

Weather map for this Thursday shows a strong 
November storm over the Great Lakes.

Certain weather patterns have a seasonal familiarity.

We're all acquainted with wintertime nor'easters in New England, severe weather outbreaks in the Plains in the springtime, and late summer and autumn hurricanes menacing the Gulf Coast. 

There's another classic weather type this time of year, and that's the big Great Lakes storms.

November is the big month for these intense storms that get going in the Plains and reach peak intensity as the pass northeastward through the Great Lakes.

They get so strong over the lakes in part because the water there is still relatively warm from the summer.  This warm, moist air feeds energy into these storms, much like the much larger bathwater of the Gulf Stream muscle up those winter nor'easters in New England. 

One of those Great Lakes storms is set to blossom later this week. In the grand scheme of things, this one will be far from the most intense you can get, but it'll set off some typical November drama. 

In the Great Lakes, there will be stormy seas and battering waves, so I'm sure shippers will take note.  On the back side of these storms, there's often some pretty good snows.  Parts of the northwestern Great Lakes will get some snow out of this.  

These Great Lakes storms are also often the cause of some severe weather in the Midwest and South, and that seems possible with this late week storm, too.  However, at this point it doesn't look like it will be a big outbreak.

For us in Vermont these Great Lakes storms usually give us a bout of strong, warm southerly winds, a burst of pretty decent rainfall, followed by colder west winds and snow showers.

That seems to be our fate with this one.  After a nice week, we'll get that warm, windy, wet weather on Friday and maybe into Saturday, followed by chillier, snow showery weather late in the weekend. 

As mentioned, this particular storm won't be historic, but just your typical November inclemency. 

Some of these Great Lakes storms in the past are well remembered, though. The most famous one has to be the November, 1975 storm that sank the ship Edmund Fitzgerald in Lake Superior.   OF course you know the song that disaster inspired.

A far worse storm hit the Great Lakes in November, 1913, sinking 19 ships in Lake Huron, killing 247 people. The storm was known as the "White Hurricane" for the blizzard that accompanied it.  Winds gusted to 80 mph during the storm in Cleveland.

In 1940, a storm hit the Pacific Northwest. That one was responsible for the famous "Galloping Gertie" collapse of the Tacoma Narrows Bridge.

Armistice Day Blizzard, November, 1940 in Minnesota.

This storm re-formed in the Midwest and Great Lakes on Armistice Day, November 11 that year. Air ahead of the storm was very mild, which inspired legions of duck hunters to take to the marshes.

The storm's cold front brought a sudden drop in temperatures to well below zero and an intense blizzard. Many of these duck hunters became lost and stranded and died. Three boats sank in Lake Superior, killing 58 mariners. 

The Great Appalachian Storm of 1950 was further east, moving up the west slopes of the Appalachians and into the eastern Great Lakes. That storm produced an intense blizzard and record cold temperatures in parts of the Great Lakes and east. One town in West Virginia saw 62 inches of snow.

To the east of the storm center, those strong south winds typical of these Great Lakes storms grew especially intense. Winds gusted to 108 mph in Newark, New Jersey, 94 mph in New York City and 70 mph up here in Burlington, Vermont.  This storm killed 160 people. 

Another Great Lakes storm in November, 2013 wasn't particularly memorable as a big windstorm on the open waters of the lakes. But it did cause an intense tornado outbreak in and around Illinois that killed three people and injured more than 125 others. 

With this kind of track record for November Great Lakes storms, we can be thankful that the one later this week won't be of that caliber.