More Tornadoes, Storms In Weird Locations, But Still No Signs Of Rain Or Anything Here In Vermont

Screenshot from a video showing a large tornado in
North Dakota Sunday. The state was hit by as many
as 19 twisters yesterday. 

While we in Vermont can't even get a sprinkle of rain, weird storms have been hitting areas that are usually not particular stormy, especially this time of year. 

We had the tornadoes in Utah Saturday, which I've already mentioned in this here blog thingy.  I've got an update on that below, but first, more odd tornadoes, this time in North Dakota. 

During Sunday afternoon, a total of 22 reports of tornadoes came in, all but three of them mostly along a narrow north-south line in central parts of the state. The actual number of tornadoes will be determined by the National Weather Service.

Observers said this was probably the biggest September North Dakota tornado outbreak on record. 

The tornadoes hit sparsely populated areas, though there was damage in the tiny central North Dakota communities of Denhoff and Cannon Ball.   

The situation kept meteorologists exceptionally busy, as tornado warnings blared across central North Dakota most of the afternoon and evening.  At one point, storm chaser Brian Copic had two tornadoes in his sights: A large, wedged shaped twister and a skinnier one nearby. 

North Dakota does get tornadoes, averaging about 29 of them per year.  But we're generally past the season for twisters there. But Sunday was an exception. 

The direction of Sunday's storms was a little off, too. They headed north to northwest, not in an east or northeast that most tornadic storms travel. 

North Dakota is also not known for its heavy rain especially in the autumn.  It's in the middle of North America. Humid Gulf of Mexico or Pacific Ocean air has a lot of trouble making it that far north by September, so rainfall is usually fairly sparse. 

However,  Bismarck, North Dakota got more rain in an hour Sunday than they normally do in the entire month of September.  Just under two inches came within that hour, compared to the 1.72 inches that usually falls all month. The storm total in Bismarck Sunday was 2.44 inches.  

Not surprisingly, the city and points south were hit by widespread flash flooding. 

It's been a rough year for severe weather in North Dakota, even by their standards. Four tornadoes and 100 mph straight line winds hit areas near Grand Forks about a month ago. North Dakota also just approved for disaster assistance from damage caused by tornadoes, high winds and flooding back on June 20-21.

In Utah, two homes, two houses trailers, a hay barn and fifth-wheel trailer were destroyed in the tornado. Nobody was hurt, but several pets are missing. Two additional houses were damaged and power lines have come down. 

With Sunday's outbreak, it looks like North Dakota will have had about 60 tornadoes this year, the most there in a single year. 

VERMONT LEFT OUT

Here in Vermont, we often get the remnants of any big storms to our west. Usually in the form of some autumn rain. We could really use it, but, again, not this time. The drought stays strong. 

The Plains storm is lifting directly north into Canada and dissipating. It won't give us any rain at all. Instead, the forecast is the same as it was yesterday: It will be warm and dry through Thursday. Then, a rainless cold front will hit Friday and it will turn cool and dry. Then it will probably warm up again. 

Our next chance of rain isn't until September 25 or 26, but even that is highly uncertain. That storm might go by to our south, missing us again.  

We don't want tornadoes here, but it would be nice if one of those tornadic systems spun off a little rain our way. 

Odd Saturday Moment: Rare, Long-Lasting Tornado In Remote Southeast Utah

Navajo Nations Police Department today 
post this photo of a large tornado in 
(checks notes) remote extreme 
southeast Utah. 

Tornado alley in a remote corner of Utah?

An often large tornado spent at least an hour intermittently on the ground around Montezuma Creek in extreme southeast Utah. 

That's very close to the Four Corners, where the borders of Utah, Colorado, Arizona and New Mexico meet. 

The tornado and rotating supercell thunderstorm was still at it around 2 p.m. local time ( 4 p.m. Eastern). It appeared to be crossing the state line and heading into extreme southwest Colorado

The Navajo Nation  Police Department said so far, three homes had been damaged but there were no injuries. 

Police were warning people to say off the roads and to see shelter. The Utah Highway Patrol and San Juan County Sheriff's were en route to the area to help, 

Tornadoes are fairly rare in Utah, as the state averages about two or three per year. However, this part of Utah almost never sees tornadoes. Especially ones as large as this one, and those that last a long time like this twister has. 

San Juan County, where today's tornado hit, also had one back on July 12, said Matthew Cappucci of MyRadar Weather Radar. 

 The area where the tornado hit was only under a marginal risk of severe thunderstorms, a low level alert in which only isolated instances of severe storms were forecast. Tornadoes were not predicted. 

Severe thunderstorms have been expected further south in New Mexico.

An upper level low centered near the storms apparently created enough spin in the atmosphere to support supercells and the tornado.  

The tornado and severe weather hit on what has been an otherwise relatively uneventful weather day in the United States. 

Tumbleweeds On The Attack: Utah Neighborhood Buried

Tumbleweeds littered this Utah neighborhood. 
Photo from KUTV 

 Here's a forecast you'll probably never see here in Vermont:

"Tumbleweeds, heavy at times, mixing with and changing to snow."  

Actually that forecast happened nowhere, but that precise weather event hit the lucky town of South Jordan, Utah. Or at least one neighborhood in that community. 

High winds - part of the storm that socked California's Sierra Nevada mountains with that well-publicized blizzard this weekend - caused damage and snow in Utah too.

Before the snow arrived, the strong winds blew the tumbleweeds into the Daybreak neighborhood of South Jordan. 

At least one car was buried and at least a couple homes had tumbleweeds stacked up reaching the second floor. 

The city came in with dumpsters and a backhoe to clear the tumbleweeds. Which just kept coming as they did that. At least until it started snowing. 

It was probably harder to remove the tumbleweeds once they got covered with snow, but at least the colder weather stopped additional ones from blowing in.  You gotta look on the bright side whenever you can, right?

News reports indicate another Utah town, Eagle Mountain, also experienced tumblegeddon over the weekend. 

The storm that created the tumbleweed attack was pretty intense in Utah.  The roof of a Salt Lake City church blew off.  The Snowbird and Alta ski resorts in Utah were forced to close early Saturday due to high winds and lightning. 

This isn't the first recent tumbleweed attack in the U.S. A neighborhood in Bakersfield, California endured piles of them from a February storm. 

Tumbleweeds are an aggressive invasive species in the West and frequent cause problems when they pile up in wind storms. 

Here's a news clip which includes the tumbleweeds as people tried to remove them even as snow complicated the effort. Click on this link to view, or if you see the image below click on that.