Indiana Mobile Home Park Owners Ban Air Conditioners For Vulnerable Residents

A chain of mobile home communities is banning window
air conditioning units like this one. The policy is a danger
to elderly and ill people living in these units. 

Every one in awhile, a local news story captures my attention and enrages me. 

Which brings us to a mobile home community in South Bend, Indiana.  

As television station WNDU reports, the Countryside Village mobile home park does not allow window air conditioning units. 

Many of  Countryside Village's residents are elderly.  Older people are especially vulnerable to the effects of hot weather .

WNDU interviewed a gentleman named Charles Hicks, a disabled veteran who lives in the mobile home park.  

He was ordered  by the mobile home park owners to remove his window air conditioner. The heat immediately built up his his home, and he found himself struggling to breathe.  

The television station interviewed Hicks on June 29, when the high temperature in South Bend reached 91 degrees. That day, he said, "By the end of the week, am I still going to be here? Or will I be in the hospital? Fighting for my life?"

The next day, a day with a high 92 degrees, Hicks was in the hospital, overcome by the heat. 

As in many mobile home parks, most residents own the home, but the land the homes sit on is owned by Countryside Village. 

But this is much bigger than one mobile part in Indiana. 

Countryside Village is owned by Yes Communities, one of the largest manufactured home parks in the United States, with roughly 270 parks and 77,000 home sites, notes pestakeholder.org.

All the Yes Communities ban window air conditioners. Residents can install central air conditioners, but that's much more  expensive than most residents can afford. They can also purchase portable air conditioners, but those are ineffective and don't readily disperse the heat from mobile homes. 

The Yes Communities policy has drawn complaints from around the country,  notes pestakeholder. org. At Five Seasons in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, one resident worried about her husband, "If he gets too hot, he could go into seizures, and it can really harm him."

In Denton, Texas, a resident at a Yes Communities mobile home park said of the window air conditioner ban: "I'm on disability, I've got multiple sclerosis and diabetes, so I can't regulate my body temperature as well as everyone else, and my living room is 103 degrees right now."

These quotes have come from news stories over the past three years. So this isn't a new issue. As noted, many residents of these mobile home communities are older. 

According to Harvard Medicine:

"Studies show that it can be hard for even healthy older adults to tell when it's too hot or if they're dehydrated. Cognitive decline exacerbates these problems. Older bodies also hold more heat than younger ones when the temperature climbs. Glands don't release as much sweat. The heart doesn't circulate blood as well, so less heat is released from vessels in the skin. Systems from the cardiovascular to the immune struggle to compensate."

I'm not sure why Yes Communities officials seem not to care about their residents' health. They have not  responded to inquiries from news agencies about the air conditioner issue. 

It's not as if nobody tried to help these residents. Indiana State Senator David Niezgodski introduced a resolution in the summer session to get lawmakers would take a good look at the issue. Nothing happened. Legislators said there were too many other things to deal with in the brief session. 

Niezgodski said he would try again next year to prevent landlords from banning window air conditioners. 

WNDU continues: 

"South Bend Common Councilwoman Sheila Niezgodski, who is married to Sen. Neizgodski, also weighed in. 

"What message are you sending to our seniors here? Sorry, you just have to languish. You just have to suffer through the heat. When we know that they're one of the most vulnerable populations that are susceptible to heat strokes. I'm really just having a hard time understanding the reasoning behind a policy that is so harmful," she said. 

Other states are also taking action. After a deadly 2021 heat wave, Oregon enacted a law that prohibits landlords from banning portable air conditioners. That includes window units. 

Even so, there are loopholes. A landlord can still ban windows air conditioners if they violate state or federal building codes. Some landlords are using that loophole to stop these air conditioners. 

Washington State also passed a law similar to Oregon's. That came over the objections of landlord lobbying groups. 

As for the mobile homes parks owned by Yes Communities, there might or might not be a sign relief. A private equity company called Brookfield is in the process of acquiring Yes Communities. I don't entirely trust private equities, but maybe they will rescind the air conditioner ban? One can only hope. 

 

Weather Evacuations: What Can Go Wrong (And Right) When Storms Disrupt Big Outdoor Shows

People being hastily moved from an outdoor venue
to an indoor venue during a high school graduation
ceremony in Orono, Minnesota in early June.
A strong thunderstorm prompted the hasty change in
plans. The move went smoothly, as the school had
 a plan in place for severe weather .

 I attended a high school graduation during early June   in Minnesota for our grandnephew Jonas, who is moving on to college in September.  

We were there for Jonas, of course, but I also got a weather moment, and a weather lesson. It involves evacuations of outdoor events when the conditions get, or threaten to become dangerous. 

The graduation was disrupted by an early summer storm. The school did almost everything right and kept everyone safe and orderly. More on that in a bit. 

Outdoor events are tricky when the weather goes bad.

Weather emergencies have always been a threat to outdoor concerts, festivals and ceremonies. 

Climate change is making this worse, like it's making so many other things worse.

As CBC reports: 

"More and more major cultural, social, business and arts events around the world are being disrupted or canceled by extreme weather events caused by climate change, according to a new study published in the International Journal of Disaster Risk Reduction. 

The study, Mapping the impact of extreme weather on global events and mass gatherings, trends and adaptive strategies details that from 2004 to 2024 more than 2,000 mass gatherings were reportedly disrupted around the world."   

Most of these events happen in the summer, when sudden, fast moving storms often require even faster evacuations. 

Lightning strikes, falling trees and branches, falling debris, collapsing stages and flash floods can happen in a blink of an eye. You need coordinated, well developed plans for this type of thing. 

It doesn't always work out that way. 

WASHINGTON FOURTH OF JULY

Severe thunderstorms forced the evacuation of the 
National Mall during the Fourth of July, creating
chaos as President Trump's team were 
incompetent planning for the event.

It's not always so safe and orderly, as we saw on the National Mall in Washington DC on July 4. 

After a day of dangerous, baking, record breaking heat, severe thunderstorms loomed over the Mall as evening settled in.  

The National Parks Service, fearing lightning strikes, high winds and flying debris, ordered a hasty evacuation of the National Mall. 

Some of the MAGA types in the crowd resisted, predictably arguing that the whole thing was woke liberals in the NPS trying to ruin Donald Trump's big night. 

It was a mess, to put it mildly 

Given the circumstances, NPS wanted everybody to call it a night and cancel Trump's speech and fireworks. 

Per the Washington Post: 

"A senior White House official said Sunday that 'all the entities involved' had recommend calling the festivities off altogether after storms forced the exodus from the Mall.

'When POTUS heard this, he told all involved to invite everyone back in and the speech would take place, even if it meant waiting until 2 a.m,' said the official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss private deliberations." 

As WaPo notes, the National Weather Service had forecast the record heat days in advance. The severe storms were deemed likely by forecasters three days before the big day. So, the Trump people should have planned for the extreme weather. They did not.  

It appears the National Parks Service did have contingency plans, but moving 100,000 or more people as a storm bore down is not easy. Especially if some of them are unruly.  

However, the whole shebang was designated a National Special Security Event, because the president was making an appearance there.  The designation put the Secret Service in charge of security and emergencies. 

Since management of all federal agencies, including Secret Service, have been reduced to haphazard, incompetent groups because they're run by Trump lackeys and not professionals, things were bound to take a bad turn. 

Especially since the designation meant added layers of security screening for those entering and exiting the Mall.

National Parks Officers were left to deal with the disaster. 

WaPo paints a picture of how it all went: 

"....as skies darkened, lightning flashed and gusting winds swept through the Mall just after 7 p.m., crows of people refused to heed the calls to evacuate. Many had already waited for house in security lines in the heat. 

'Show is over. Pleas keep moving,' one officer shouted to stragglers. 'Rally canceled.' shouted another. Exits back up. Some people complained that it was unclear where they should head, and the scene grew increasingly tense. Social media showed people yelling back at security personnel and National Guard troops flipping over a table to persuade people to flee."

As noted, it would have been better to call it a night. But due to Trump's directive, people had to go through security again. Many people didn't bother.   The whole event was a disappointment, and several people were taken to the hospital, mostly for heat-related illnesses. 

GRADUATION

The Minnesota graduation I attended about a month ago was a completely different world. The crowd was much smaller than at the Mall on the Fourth of July. The weather wasn't broiling hot as it was on July 4 in Washington. 

And the people making decisions on what to do with the weather and the crowds knew what they were doing. 

The high school graduation was held in Orono, Minnesota, an outer suburb about 17 miles west of downtown Minneapolis. 

Before the graduation even got underway,  I checked the radar and found a band of thunderstorms west of Orono, Minnesota. I questioned the decision to go ahead with the outdoor ceremony.

The school decided to go ahead with the outdoor ceremony.  

It was a no-win decision, really. The storms could have dissipated or veered off to the north or south leaving Orono in the clear. That  would have angered participates who preferred a much more accessible outdoor ceremony. 

Or, as how it turned out, the storms kept marching toward Orono strengthening as they did so. As we watched the graduation ceremony, we also saw a walk of dark clouds approaching steadily from the west.  Soon, we saw the storm's shelf cloud, with flashes of lightning flickering beneath it.

That's when the call came to stop the proceedings and move inside. That was about halfway through the ceremony.

This was a modest-sized event with maybe a couple thousand people in a pleasant Minneapolis suburb with sturdy buildings nearby. 

 Pretty much everybody got inside, to the gym, and the graduation continued, almost seamlessly picking up where it left off.

But it did remind me of other outdoor events with larger crowds, bigger storms and poorer planning. Any outdoor event, no matter how mellow, can turn into a deadly fiasco. Even worse than the National Mall Fourth of July mess. 

Some examples:

SUGARLAND

On August 13, 2011,  the popular country band Sugarland was set to play at the Indiana State Fair. As a severe thunderstorm arrived, wind brought down a large portion of the 62-foot tall, 32-ton stage structure. Steel beams and rigging crashed on the crowd, killing 7 and injuring more than 100. 

Forecasters had said severe thunderstorms were expected. However, fair and entertainment officials ahead of the Sugarland did not discuss public safety, just the timing of the show and the fact it was going to rain. 

Sugarland band members were told about the impending rain, and Sugarland said they would go ahead and play, since they often performed concerts in the rain. However, they were not told of the risk of strong winds.

By the time it came apparent a severe thunderstorm with powerful winds was about to hit, it was too late to evacuate Sugarland fans in time before disaster struck.

GLASTONBURY

In other instances, there is not much you can do, The roughly 170,000 people at the 2005 Glastonbury Festival endured an intense heat wave, followed by the most intense storm locals had seen. in 15 years. Lightning cut power, and torrential rains flooded much of the site. In fact, a river burst its banks and sent a torrent of water across a field full of tents.

Somehow, there were few casualties back at that festival, but it really could have been a fatal day.  

Unfortunately, as the Fourth of July National Mall fiasco indicates, some event organizers will not always plan for extreme weather. Or, the allure of revenue might make them make some poor choices.

Next time you go to an outdoor concert, or fair, or festival, check the weather forecast yourself. If it looks really, really iffy, you might want to cancel your plans to be on the safe side. 

 

Monday Evening Storm Update: Late Tuesday Vermont Storm Forecast

NOAA's Storm Prediction  Center has the highest
risk of tornadoes in northern New England. The 
little hash marks mean there's a chance there
could be a strong tornado thrown in. 

I know everyone is watching the storm threat for Tuesday evening and night, and unfortunately the forecast still looks kind of scary. 

The overall threat level and location of the threat is still about the same as we talked about this morning. 

This is easily one of the most intense severe weather forecast I can remember around here. Forecasts don't necessarily come true, but the signs still point toward some truly dangerous weather. 

An enhanced risk of severe storms (level three out of five) is still up for northern New York, northern Vermont and New Hampshire and northwestern Maine. 

Before we get there, we have a few showers are coming through this evening, maybe even a rumble of thunder. No biggie. 

We're still on for a really hot day tomorrow.  Maybe a few showers and clouds could come through in the morning. Maybe. Maybe not. But that shouldn't interfere with any big storms late in the day.

We'll just sweat it out in near record heat through the day. Just temperatures in the 90s with a heat advisory in effect.  Wildfire smoke might help hold temperatures down just a bit with low 90s instead of mid-90s. 

Then we get to the evening. By then, a good chunk of southern Quebec will have been raked with damaging winds, big hail and probably at least one or two tornadoes if not more. 

We're still looking at most of the storms coming in around sunset and into the night. Here are the risks:

WIND

This is the big issue. Some of the storms might be individual supercells, not connected to the any lines of storms, Those supercells can create intense straight line winds. Not to mention tornadoes and/or large hail, which we'll get to in a bit. 

There will also be short lines or clumps of storms, all capable of winds of 60 mph, or 70 mph or even more in a couple spots. 

NOAA's Storm Prediction Center has northern Vermont, along with northern New Hampshire and interior Maine in a 30 percent chance zone of damaging winds. That means, if you're standing anywhere in this risk region there's at least a 30 percent chance of wind damage within 25 miles of where you ar. 

That seems a bit low, but it's much higher than we usually see when severe thunderstorms are forecast around here. Expect power outages and tree damage, even structural damage to buildings if this forecast comes true. 

TORNADOES

Tornadoes, too, is about as high a risk we can get in northern New England.. True, the risk of tornadoes is definitely lower than the destructive winds. But still, the risk is higher than I've seen in a long time. The Storm Prediction Center even has the possibility of stronger tornadoes, EF-2 or higher. That's exceptionally rare for northern New England.

Individual supercells can spin up tornadoes, of course. But there could be areas of rotation embedded in some lines of storms. 

HAIL

The Storm Prediction Center has also upped the chances of large hail. Supercells could produce hail as big as two inches in diameter. That's as big as hen eggs, which can definitely dent cars, break windows and damage to siding. 

TIMING/LOCATION

Highest chances of storms are between 8 p.m. and a little after midnight. Storms will tend to fade as they approach southern Vermont late at night as they lose their atmospheric support.

CAVEATS

The area under highest risk is pretty broad brush. There's going to be short lines of storms or supercells. It's possible the bulk of the worst storms could head toward Maine. Or New York. Or Vermont. It's impossible to tell just yet.

These storms are going to be somebody's problem for sure. We just don't know whose problem just yet. At this point, just be aware the weather might really get rough and dangerous tomorrow evening and night. If all this misses Vermont, great! If not, we'll have to deal with it.

Between now and tomorrow afternoon, if you know if somebody is camping in the woods, definitely try to get them out of the forests by late tomorrow afternoon. Falling trees in high winds are no joke. 

 

After A Perfect Summer Weekend, Vermont's Weather Week Turns Hot, And For Some Of Us, Scary

An enhanced, level three out of five risk for 
severe storms is up for tomorrow night in the 
orange areas of this map. That's a rare risk level
for this part of the country. Damaging winds
are the biggest risk. But there could be large
hail or even a couple of tornadoes. 

Our perfect weather weekend in Vermont is over, and it's time to face reality. 

The forecast for the first part of this week, especially Tuesday turns very hot. 

And for many people, especially in northern parts of the state, the forecast turns frightening. A significant severe storm outbreak is now expected across northern New York and northern New England Tuesday evening and night. 

That includes Vermont, especially for areas along and north of Route 2.

More on that in a bit

You probably wouldn't call Sunday's weather cool, but at least as measured in Burlington, the low temperature was 57 degrees. was the "coldest" start to the day since June 24. 

But, Sunday afternoon temperatures reached the low to mid 80s, so summer lives on,

Today to an extent, and especially Tuesday, we will briefly experience the other side of summer. The side that's no so pleasant. The side that's uncomfortable, annoying, even dangerous, as noted above Let's get into the details, in chronologicalorder

TODAY

It will try to get hotter today, but a semi-warm front will try to interfere with that process with some clouds and maybe some showers. But the sun will be out much of the time.  The scattered showers will be pretty light, and mostly in northern Vermont late this afternoon and this evening, 

Highs will get well into the 80s. 

TUESDAY 

This time period will bring Vermont some of its most dramatic weather in years. There's still some question about how hot it will get. And how humid.

The forecast, as I noted yesterday, was for hot air to blast in from Montana and North Dakota. 

Large parts of the northern and central Rocky Mountains were absolutely insane yesterday. It was as hot as 116 degrees in Montana.  Several cities set all time record highs including 115 in Miles City, Montana,  111 in Billings, Montana, 109  in both Salt Lake City, Utah and Sheridan, Wyoming.  

It won't get to 116 here in Vermont thank goodness, but we do expect a one-day flash of intense heat. 

Highs should get well into the 90s amid increasing humidity. The forecast high in Burlington tomorrow is 98 degrees.  Which, believe it or not would not be a record high, as it was 100 degrees on that date in 1995.

It is possible, though somewhat unlikely, that a couple places in Vermont could touch 100 degrees tomorrow. 

The humidity Tuesday might be a little higher than previously expected. We noticed dew points in the 70s in parts of North Dakota yesterday. So we can at least expect dew points to be in the oppressive 65 to 70 degree range. 

It'll be pretty breezy tomorrow, too, so it will be a blast furnace kind of day. Needless to say, a heat advisory is up for most of Vermont. 

That all sets us up for what could be a scary Tuesday night

TUESDAY NIGHT

I haven't seen such a threatening severe thunderstorm forecast in years. A sharp cold front will be moving south from Quebec and hitting all that hot, humid air. Conditions are just right to produce what could be a helluva severe storm outbreak in northern areas especially. 

And it will hit on the 31st anniversary of one of the worse derechos in the regions history. Early on July 15, 1995 and intense band of storms caused widespread damage in the Adirondacks and southern Vermont. 

This time, the target is, as noted, northern New England. As it stands now, the biggest risk zone is along and north of a line from Massena, New York, to Burlington and St. Johnsbury, Vermont, Berlin, New Hampshire, and on up through the northwestern half of Maine. 

Those areas are under an enhanced, level three out of five level alert for severe storms Tuesday night an evening.  That's a rare designation for our region. The last time any part of Vermont was under an enhanced risk level was on July 16, 2024. 

Straight line winds is the main, but not only risk with these potential storms. These winds could be much more powerful than your standard issue severe thunderstorm. We're talking  maybe 70 to 80 mph  or more in a few locations. (As in all severe storm outbreaks, the area affected will have spotty areas with lots of damage, with other areas not seeing anything super dramatic.)

Large hail is a definite possibility. If you have a garage, put your car inside it tomorrow night. 

There's also, once again,  a tornado risk with this outbreak. NOAA's Storm Prediction Center says one or two tornados in the northern New England risk zone could be strong. That's an extremely rare thing to say for this neck of the woods. 

And consider this: The only place in the United States that might get a tornado tomorrow or tomorrow night is northern New England. I guess we're the new tornado alley>

This is also going to be a deceptive severe storm event. Usually, things get active in the mid and late afternoon and continue into the early evening. But at 6 p.m. tomorrow, it will probably be sunny and hot, with few if any signs of impending storms. 

But the storms should start to cross the border from Quebec toward 8 p.m. The risk of severe weather will probably continue until around 2 a.m. Wednesday. 

Nighttime storms are particularly dangerous, because it's harder to see them coming. And many people have shut off their phones for the night, so they can't receive severe storm or tornado warning.s 

This is an especially dangerous situation for campers in the woods. If you know anybody is doing that, tell them to get the hell out of the woods and to a safe place by early evening tomorrow.  Note that the 1995 derecho killed at least five campers in the Adirondacks. 

Another weird thing about this potential severe outbreak is its limited location, at least in the United States. (A broad area of southern Quebec is also under the gun with this system Tuesday afternoon and night).

Given that this is happening at night, the ability to sustain the storms will wane as we get later into the night. Also, the atmospheric wind patterns that will help make these storms so intense will probably start to break down by or shortly after after midnight. l 

So the storms will begin to fall apart as they head toward the southern half of Vermont.  By the time you get south of Route 4, there is only a marginal (one out of five on the risk scale) risk of severe weather. If you are in Bennington or Brattleboro, chances are you won't see any kind of thunderstorm, not even some lame garden variety thing. 

Back north, if this thing goes the way current forecasts suggest, there's going to be some pretty widespread power outages. A lot of trees will come down, some into homes, I imagine. Suddenly, I'm not so thrilled by the large trees in my St. Albans, Vermont yard. 

Obviously, forecasts can change. Volatile weather setups like this are notorious for being either worse, or much less severe than forecast.  One thing we can hope for is if this whole thing slows down. If the storms wait until later at night than forecast, then they probably won't be as severe. That's a hope, not a forecast. 

I obviously will have a big update tomorrow morning in this here blog thingy. 

Then, when we get to tomorrow night, have a way to receive weather warnings. A NOAA weather radio is a great resource.  I'm also betting local TV meteorologists will cut into regular broadcasting to provide warnings and updates as the storms loom. 

It's been a weird summer. Sunny and nice, but also very stormy. So here we go again. 

 

One More Really Hot Day In Vermont, Then It Gets (Slightly) Better

National Weather Service heat risk map for today 
calls for another day of severe to extreme heat in 
the eastern U.S. Purple shading is the most intense het.

The overnight low early this morning in Burlington, Vermont was 76 degrees, so there wasn't much overnight relief from the heat. 

No relief is forthcoming today, though there is at least a dim light at the end of the heat tunnel More on that in a bit. 

THE HEAT SO FAR

A tiny saving grace is the heat hasn't been quite as intense as expected in Vermont, with daily highs running a couple degrees lower than forecasts for the past couple of days. 

That's a contrast to pretty much everywhere in the eastern United States, where the heat has lived up to advance billing.    Yesterday, in Frederick, Maryland,  where I was visiting, I experienced the hottest weather I've ever been in, with a reading of 102 degrees.

In New York City, Central Park reached 100 degrees Friday, the first time it's gotten that hot since July 18. 2012, when it was also 100. Washington DC reached a record high of 102 degrees Friday. The same high temperature of 102 is predicted in Washington today and tomorrow, making Fourth of July celebrations downright dangerous. 

Here in Vermont, it reached 96 in Burlington Friday, short of the predicted peak of 100 degrees.

Montpelier reached 90, hot enough to tie the record high for the date.

So this heat wave hasn't turned out to be the historic Vermont heat wave some of us expected.  It's still hot and very humid. Dangerously so. That Vermont has been falling slightly short of predicted high temperatures doesn't reduce the risk.  The longer a heat wave goes on, the worse it is on the human body. We're on day three today, so those that are vulnerable to the heat are having their worst day yet.

Today is a perfect day to kidnap your elderly or ill neighbors and take them to a cool place. 

Thunderstorms have been harassing Vermonters, too. Friday wasn't as wild as Thursday. But some pretty good, non-severe thunderstorms blew through parts of central Vermont in the evening. The National Weather Service in South Burlington also issued a special weather statement for  a strong storm that clipped the Northeast Kingdom, but that storm quickly dissipated.

Let's get into the specifics of what's coming next. 

TODAY:

It will be almost as hot as yesterday. It really won't feel any different than yesterday. Most of the state will be in the low 90s, with mid 90s for highs in the Banana Belt hot valleys. 

Once again, because of the heat and the humidity, thunderstorms are a risk. I don't think they'll be particularly widespread or severe. NOAA's Storm Prediction Center has the best chance of strong storms being south and west of Interstate 89 today. In that location there's a marginal, (level one out of five risk)  for storms today. 

More storms and showers should be scattered about tonight ahead of a super weak cold front heading toward us. It will still be a horribly stuffy night.

SATURDAY

Some relief begins. The risk of showers and storms diminishes to nothing north during the morning, and that trend will drift southward during the day. More importantly, you'll start to notice a change in the air during the afternoon and evening. Especially north. It won't turn much less humid, but it will feel a little better. 

Dew points, a measure of how humid it feels out there. will start out near 70 in the morning, which is terribly steamy. By evening, the dew point will be in the OK but not great low 60s.

SUNDAY

The dew points will continue to drift a little lower by Saturday night and Sunday.  That means dawn will break Sunday with temperatures within a few degrees either side of 60, which will feel much better. 

Sunday should be a classic Vermont summer day, much like last Sunday was. That means highs in the 80s, a little warmer than average. Humidity will be reasonable. 

NEXT WEEK

Monday morning will start off cool and dry, with lows in the 50s to near 60, so pretty nice. The warmth and the humidity will creep up again. Some sort of disturbance looks like it will pass  through on Monday. Early indications suggest some heavy rain might fall on southern Vermont with much lighter stuff up north. 

It's an iffy little system, though, so we'll probable be some adjustments to the forecast.

Tuesday and Wednesday, and probably Thursday  turn really warm and humid again, but not as bad as today. Still, warmer spots could touch 90 again midweek. 

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.

 

Dangerous Heat, Humidity Blast Into Vermont Today For An Extended Stay, Severe Storm Threat Looms, Too.

Heat risk map for Thursday. Purple is extreme heat and dark 
red is major. It's rare to have so much purple in this
map, Note the flecks of purple here in Vermont. 

 We had one more nice, cool Vermont dawn today, with temperatures in the 50s as the sun broke over the Green Mountains. 

Yesterday was warm, for sure, but not humid, so the lack of moisture in the air let things col off overnight. 

Going through the next several days at least, you'll want to take it very easy, keep hydrated, and make sure your neighbors and relatives are OK. 

Let's get into the updated day by day outlook.

TODAY

The hot, humid air is at our doorstep, and will flood in today. The dew point, an indicator of how sticky the air feels, was in the comfortable 50s early this morning. Those dew points will be in the icky mid 60s to around 70 by late afternoon, and it will only get worse from there. 

Most of us will get into well into the 80s today with the hottest valleys maybe touching 90 degrees if it stays sunny enough. If it hits 90 in Burlington today, that would probably be the start of five consecutive days in the 90s. 

Heat waves that long or longer have only happened 16 times in Burlington since the late 1800s. 

The forecast for the increasing heat is certain, the forecast for thunderstorms is not. 

As we've noted the past few days, we'll be prone to batches of thunderstorms diving down from Ontario and Quebec. And since the air will be so hot and humid over the next few days, a few homegrown strong storms could pop up, too.

For now, as of early this morning, NOAA's Storm Prediction Center has most of Vermont under a slight risk, level two of five of severe storms today and tonight. They also have - once again - a low but not zero chance of a brief tornado, this time in northwest Vermont and northern New York 

This will get updated one way or another later this morning, as it's hard to predict the path and intensity of these packages of thunderstorms that will come through. Not only today and tonight, but through this heat wave. 

WEDNESDAY

The core of the heat wave arrives. Dawn will break muggy with temperatures in the upper 60s to low 70s. An extreme heat watch is in effect for the Champlain Valley, low elevations of southwest Vermont and the lower Connecticut valley Wednesday afternoon to Friday evening. That means the heat index is expected to be at or above 105 degrees during this spell. 

This will almost definitely be upgraded to an extreme heat warning soon. Such a heat warning only applies to heat indexes of 105 or above Since the rest of Vermont away from the hotter valleys will "only" see a heat index in the 100 to 105 degree range, they'll probably fall under a heat advisory soon. 

As far as actual temperatures, highs tomorrow should be in the low to mid 90s, with the hotter readings in the warmer valleys. Dew points will rise to the mid 70s, which is fairly rare for Vermont. The weather tomorrow and Thursday will be typical for a Florida July. Or even worse than that.

Orlando, Florida yesterday had a mid -afternoon temperature of 92 with a dew point of 74. Mid-afternoon tomorrow in Burlington is forecast to bring a temperature of 95 and a dew point of 75.

Burlington will very likely have one of its top ten worst heat indexes on record, and has a slight chance of breaking the all time heat index record of 111.4 set on August 26, 1948. The forecast peak heat index for Wednesday is 109, which would place it at #3 in the top 10 list of worst heat indexes the city has seen, at least since they started keeping track of such things in 1947.

The one potential saving grace is if thunderstorms bring the temperature down. Or, thunderstorms that had broken up send clouds our way, which would mean slightly lower temperatures but no relief from teak humidity. 

Again, it's impossible to predict the timing and position of the most concentrated thunderstorms tomorrow but they could happen anytime. Some storms could be strong again. With all this humidity, thunderstorm rains would be torrential perhaps enough to set off a highly localized flash flood,

THURSDAY/FRIDAY

More of the same with probably the most intense heat on Thursday. For now the National Weather Service is going for a high of 98 in Burlington and Springfield, and well into the 90s elsewhere. There is a chance we could see a 100 degree reading or two.

How about this for a break: Friday should be cooler than Thursday, with highs only in the low to mid 90s. And the steamy air will continue. 

Nighttime lows Wednesday through Friday will be in the low to mid 70s in most of state with the stuffy air in place, Those without air conditioning won't see any real nighttime relief. Keep a close eye on your  elderly or ill neighbors that don't have air conditioning. This is dangerous for them 

.The extreme humidity will continue both days. As will the chance of thunderstorms, some potentially strong and/or torrential. If the storms, or clouds from distant storms cover the sky in the afternoons, high temperatures will be a little cooler forecast. 

WEEKEND AND BEYOND

Often, heat waves in Vermont end with a big whoosh of dry, cool, refreshing air straight from the friendly folks in central or northern Canada. That won't the case this time. 

Instead, temperatures will slowly drift downwards, Highs would still be near 90 on Saturday and in the mid and upper 80s Sunday and Monday. Humidity will stay high, too, but not quite as terrible as this week will be, 

But since the effects of heat waves accumulates in people as the days go by, this allegedly "cooler" air won't be enough to help people who endured the heat without air conditioning, You'll still want to make sure your elderly friends and neighbors are OK.  

 

Enjoy The Low Humidity, Extreme Humidity, Torrid Heat, Storms On The Way To Vermont

National Weather Service heat risk map for this coming
Thursday. Click on the map to make it bigger and 
easier to see. Purple is extreme heat and risk. Dark red
is major heat. I don't remember the last time I've
seen so much purple in the heat risk map. Also
notice the flecks of purple even in Vermont. 

Saturday was another perfect summer weather day in Vermont - mostly sunny, a nice breeze, low humidity some pretty clouds. 

This morning dawned clear and cool. Temperatures were in the 50s statewide.  Despite all the rain lately, we've had a fair number of days like this in the late spring and early summer this year.

One thing that I knew we'd lose eventually is the clear, unpolluted skies that allowed us an unrestricted view of the Green Mountains and hills, shimmering green as far as the eye can see.

Now, this morning, I notice wildfire smoke beginning to creep in. To nobody's surprise due to a deep drought in the Rocky Mountains, large wildfires have broken out, especially in Utah.  There's also fires burning in a long stripe from Alaska, through central Canada to central and northern Quebec. So far, it's not nearly as bad up there as in recent years, but they're burning.

The smoke has to go somewhere, and sometimes it ends up in New England.   

There is smoke visible on the satellite photos this morning in Quebec and northern Vermont. It's not enough to harm air quality, but the air will probably look kind of hazy, especially north. For the rest of the summer and into the early autumn, we are going to continue to see some hazy days because of this. Not everyday, but the chances of crystal clear air has diminished until autumn rains and snows really hit.

Smoke is the least of our worries at this point, though. We've got a volatile week coming up that features high heat, even  higher humidity and a volatile atmosphere that could trigger more rounds of severe storms. 

TODAY:

Another beauty. Sunshine with low humidity and highs in the low 80s most places, with a few upper 70s northern hills and maybe a few mid 80s in the warmest banana belt town in the Champlain Valley and southeast Vermont.  

So it'll be a perfect day to do anything Vermonty, hike, bike, hit the garden, play softball or frisbee,  go to the beach, fall asleep on a hammock, get a maple creemee. It should be illegal to stay indoors on a day like today. 

Like yesterday, you can even lay in a grassy field and watch the puffy clouds billow up over the mountains. You know, that cloud looks like a dog, that other one looks like an ice cream cone, that third cloud looks like Weird Al Yankovic. You get the idea.

The only potential problem is a very weak disturbance that could touch off an isolated shower or garden variety thundershower near the Canadian border. No biggie.

MONDAY

One last nice day. Dawn will bring more cool air, with temperatures in the 50s to around 60.  Under sunny skies, it will get well into the 80s Warmer towns will be around 87, 88 or even 89 degrees, so pretty damn warm. But the humidity will stay low, so it will be quite tolerable out there.

TUESDAY

A transition day as the hot, humid air begin to roll in. Dawn might still be comfortably dry, but by afternoon and evening you should really start to feel the humidity. Highs should get into the 80s again. No 90s yet because of clouds and a risk of showers and thunderstorms. 

WEDNESDAY. 

A real wild card, with some questions in the forecast. Will the hot air really get in here full force? Meteorologist are leaning toward a  "yes" answer. If it does, temperatures will soar well into the 90s. Since we'll be near the edge of the torrid, muggy air, instability in the atmosphere could be almost off the charts. Some high altitude, shifting winds could enter the picture. If that happens, we could be looking at severe thunderstorms. 

The National Weather Service in South Burlington notes that some models keep the hottest, most humid air off a little to our southwest Wednesday. In that case, it would still be very warm and somewhat humid, but not killer hot and without the lightning bolts, dark clouds and potential high winds nipping at our heels.

THURSDAY

This is the day Vermont is most likely to take par in the nasty heat dome that's setting up. Many cities in the Midwest and up and down the East Coast should get over 100 degrees. The forecast high Thursday in Boston and New York is around 103. Washington DC is forecasting 104. 

I wouldn't be surprised if a 100 degree reading or two snuck in to southeastern Vermont. If that happens, it'll be two years in a row with 100 degree heat in the Green Mountain State. Such heat is rare, but I guess it's becoming less so in our age of climate change.

Forecasts have the rest of Vermont well into the 90s. As of today, forecasted highs Thursday are 97 in Burlington, 95 in Montpelier, 96 in Rutland and 98 in Springfield. 

The only caveat to this is there are almost always weak ripples of energy in the atmosphere. If one comes through Thursday afternoon, that would spark a bunch of thunderstorms that would cool the air a little but do nothing to help with the humidity. 

FRIDAY

Temperatures are forecast to be in the 100s again up and down the East Coast. Vermont might get vague relief from an approaching very lame cold front that would hold temperatures down to the low 90s. Um, yay? We'll wait and see on that. 

I'm sort of making light of all this heat coming out way, but seriously, this will be dangerous. Nights will be very warm and muggy, offering little relief from the daytime torrid weather. This state of affairs goes on for at least a few days The cumulative effects of the hot air over days can kill vulnerable people .

Unfortunately deaths from the heat are already a foregone conclusion in the Midwest and East due to the extreme nature of the upcoming hot spell. Let's hope the victims don't include Vermonters. 

NEXT WEEKEND

A potential "cold snap"! By that I mean daytime temperatures would "only" reach the 80s to around 90 with continued rather high humidity.  

"Chaser Convergence" Is A Rising Tornado Death Risk

Tornado beginning to develop near Blue Rapids, Kansas on
May 18.  Hundreds of storm chasers converged on this twister.
Photo via Facebook, Live Storm Chasers

 On May 18, a huge supercell thunderstorm sent a tornado stabbing into the ground east of Blue Rapids, Kansas, population about 900. 

Beneath those roiling clouds, a convoy whose members might well have matched the population of the town gathered in roughly 500 vehicles on narrow rural roads, hoping for a glimpse, a photo or a video of the tornado. 

The tornado turned out to be relatively brief and harmless. 

It's called "chaser convergence," and it's dangerous. Converging air masses help produce tornadic storms. The chasers, in turn, converge on the tornadoes.

 Storm chasing has boomed louder than the thunder that supercells produce. Many of the storm chasers are experience and responsible. They know how tornadoes behave and what the safe distance is. They follow the rules of the road. 

Others...not so much.

"As I'm sitting on the highway, it was a continuous line of cars going east for 30 minutes. I mean it was crazy," said Blue Rapids Police Chief Ryan Woodyard. 

 That's a recipe for disaster. 

"There is a chance that there cold be, you know, a line of cars stuck in a traffic jam and that a tornado side swipes them can easily take out dozens of chasers and kill multiple, multiple people at one time," Darin Brunin, a local storm chaser told television station KSNT.   

Per Yahoo News:

"Storm chasers not only have to worry about tornadoes, but also other drivers. Storm chasers report driving is one of the greatest hazards of the job, while law enforcement said managing traffic  a become even harder for small towns with limited resources."

Storm chasers do die when chasing tornadoes, or heading home from or heading to or from the chasers. Four storm chasers died in two separate accidents during the 2022 tornado season. 

Some chasers near Blue Rapids were not obeying traffic laws. If emergency vehicles were needed, chances are they wouldn't be able to get through. The day the tornado touched down east of Blue Rapids, other storms threatened different parts of Kansas on May 18. By one estimation, there were 7,000 tornado hunters roaming the flat plains of the state. 

Commissioners in Marshall County, which includes Blue Rapids. are calling for some type of action  regarding uncoordinated storm chasers. The commissioners agree that chasers can provide life saving information for the public and initiate search and rescue since they are often on the scene before first responders get there. 

Chaser convergence isn't only a problem in Marshall County, Kansas, of course. Anytime there is a well-forecasted tornado outbreak, throngs of chasers are on the scene. 

There doesn't seem to be any calls to ban or seriously regulate storm chasers. But that day might come if there are more tragedies involving the chasers. 

 

Heartwarming Hay Donations After Extreme Nebraska Wildfires. But It Doesn't Solve The Climate Change Problem

One of the huge Nebraska wildfires back on March.
Photo from Nebraska State Patrol 

This spring, Nebraska burned. At least a large part of it did.  

Amid a drought and record breaking high temperatures that further dried out the landscape, high winds fanned wildfires that burned through  820,000 acres of Nebraska rangeland. 

The worst of the fires burned in March. One of the fires blackened 600,000 acres. The blazes left numerous ranchers without feed for their cattle. Damage estimates are at least $10 million. 

This is all bad news, of course. And climate change is a prime suspect again. An insane March heat wave contributed to the conditions that led to the huge fires.  World Weather Attribution reported that the March heat wave would have been virtually impossible without climate change. 

The fires burned through just about all of the 11,000 acre ranch Mike and Kayla Wintz lease in the middle of nowhere - deep in the Sandhills of western Nebraska. With the grass gone, the cattle couldn't graze, as CBS's on the road reporter Steve Hartman noted. 

Suddenly, after the fires. Wintz and other ranchers started getting phone calls. The callers said hay was on the way, and where should we put it. At last report Wintz has received $80,000 worth of hay, all donated. 

Highways in central and western Nebraska became busy with convoys of trucks carrying hay to desperate ranchers. Some of the hay came from as far away as South Carolina. The convoys became almost like celebratory parades, as school kids lined streets to watch the trucks, fully loaded with enormous bales of hay pass by. 

"Empathy, charity and grace," Hartman concludes. 

All true. Hartman is always the feel good reporter we need when we need to see someone acting like good humans should. 

Unfortunately, I'm not as kind hearted as Hartman. Don't get me wrong, I absolutely support and love this Nebraska "hay lift," for lack of a better term. And of course I support helping your neighbor in any way you can. Whether that neighbor is literally next door or half a world away. 

However,  like so much havoc caused by, or more often made worse by climate change, massive hay donations like we've just seen in Nebraska aren't going to solve the problem. 

In the first few months of 2026, major wildfires scorched over a million acres in Nebraska, Kansas and Oklahoma, Nebraska Public Media notes.

NPM continues:

"The amount of Great Plains land burned by wildfires tripled between 1985-1994 and 2005-2014, according to a 2017 study from the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. The number of incidents also increased from 33 per year to 117 per year."

 Judging from news reports about Great Plains fires in the past three years at least, that trend  detected nearly a decade ago by UNL researchers has continued.

There's always talk of "adaptation" to extreme conditions wrought by climate change. And people in the Great Plains can adapt to an extent. They can make homes and outbuildings more resisted to fire. Improve warning systems. But if there's a drought, strong winds and hot temperatures, there's little you can do to stop the grass from burning. 

While people are contemplating wildfires, the Plains might be in for a temporary reprieve. Climate change makes fires more likely, but so does La Nina. That weather pattern tilts conditions toward dry in the central and southern Plains during the early spring. 

Early spring is peak fire season. A potentially strong El Nino is poised to replace the La Nina. An El Nino more often than not tends to turn the southern half of the Plains wetter. 

Still, El Nino will end at some point. And so the fires will come back, possibly even more ferocious than this year's as climate change continues to heat the planet. 

Here is the CBS report. Click on this link to view it, or if you see the image below, click on that. 

New Orleans Is Sinking And Scientists Say The City Is A Terminal Case

The Tragically Hip were right: New Orleans 
IS sinking, and some researchers say the
will no longer be viable in a century or 
less because of rising sea levels
and climate change 

 Back in 1989, the fantastic Canadian band Tragically Hip released one of their greatest songs, called "New Orleans Is Sinking."   

Turns out the band was pretty prescient. 

New Orleans has always been in, at best, a standoff with the Gulf of Mexico. The low lying city has always been prone to coastal flooding, especially in recent decades as the land itself sinks and climate change has begun to raise sea levels. 

Now, we're seeing new headlines, like the lede in this story from The Guardian: 

"The process of relocating people from New Orleans should start immediately, as the city has reached 'a point of  no return' that will see it surrounded by the ocean within decades due to the climate crisis, a start new study has concluded."

The fossil fuel industry that is an important part of Louisiana's economy is to blame. The coastline is subsiding, sinking downward in large part by the effects of the oil and gas industry. Along with man-made levees and diversions along the Mississippi River that means silt from the river doesn't replenish the land along the coastline. 

"The delta loses roughly a football field worth of land every half hour to an hour,"  according to PBS. 

The new research says southern Louisiana will deal with three to seven meters (roughly 10 to 23 feet) sea level rise which would drown land surrounding New Orleans and Baton Rouge.

"Ultimately the main message of the study is New Orleans is not forever and we have to plan for our future and we have to start planning now," aid Dr. Torbjorn Tomqvist, a geology professor at Tulane University and lead author of the study. 

The research harkens back to a time 125,000 years ago, when the Gulf of Mexico shoreline was north of Lake Pontchartrain, about 30 miles north of New Orleans. 

In those days, global temperatures were about 0.5 to 1.5 degrees Celsius warmer than pre-industrial levels and seas were 10 to 20 feet higher than today, notes Fox8 News in New Orleans. 

Climate change through the use of fossil fuels have made the world at least as warm as it was 125,000 years ago. "Tornqvist said that because of the increasing rate of sea level rise, combined with subsidence or the rate of sinking land, the Gulf one day reach that ridge again, putting much of Southeast Louisiana underwater," Fox8 News continued.

Jesse Keenan, one the paper's five co-authors said New Orleans is going to go away, no matter what. As for how long New Orleans will last, Keenan said it is likely decades, not centuries. Though they stress it's not imminent. The city won't drown this year or this decade, but several decades from now. 

"Even if you stopped climate change today, New Orlean's days are still numbered....It will be surrounded by open water, and you can't keep an island situated below sea level afloat. There's no amount of money that can do that," Keenan said.

Keenan summed it up with this gloomy assessment. "New Orleans is in terminal condition, and we need to be clear with the patient that it is terminal.....There is an opportunity for palliative care, we can transition people and the economy. We can get ahead of this."

The researchers said city, state and federal leaders should start working now to help people move away from New Orleans and environs. They recommend a coordinated effort, starting with the most vulnerable committees. The top suggestion is Plaquemines Parish, where many people live outside the levee system. 

Land loss to the sea is already driving depopulation along Louisiana's coastal areas. That area has lost residents since 2000, especially after big hurricanes. That population loss has a good chance of accelerating as the land continues to disappear and hurricanes continue to battler the Gulf Coast.  

"Gorilla Hail" Has Been Pounding The U.S. This Year, And It's Likely More Common Than Previously Thought

Giant hail in Wisconsin this past April.

It's been another rough year for hail storms in the United States. There's been lots of them and a few of them have been real standouts. 

Probably the most newsworthy and perhaps most extreme was the one that hit Springfield, Missouri and nearby areas on April 28. 

Baseball to softball sized hail laid wasted to probably thousands of cars. Sadly, an emu died from the hail at Dickerson Park Zoo in Springfield. Zoo workers tried their damndest to get all the zoo animals under cover. 

An emu's natural instinct is to lie down and take cover, and this emu, a 21 year old female named Adam, couldn't be coaxed indoors and died when a huge hailstone landed on his head. 

Back on March 10, a supercell that produced a destructive tornado in Kankakee, Illinois also produced immense hail that might have broken the record for the largest hailstone in Illinois history. It measured 6.616 inches in diameter and weighed 1.22 pounds. In other words, it was a little larger than a grapefruit. 

Officials are verifying those measurements before declaring it a record holder. In any event huge hailstones damaged homes in Kankakee that were never touched by the tornado.

The tornado, with maximum winds of 150 people killed three people. 

Even here in Vermont, we managed to see some rare or us golf ball sized hail on April 16 when a supercell thunderstorm crossed west to east across central Vermont. The supercell is the one that ultimately produced a brief tornado in Williamstown. 

GORILLA HAIL

Reed Timmer, one of the more popular and prolific storm chasers out there, coined the term "gorilla hail" to describe especially ferocious hailstorms with especially huge hailstones. 

Gorilla hail is generally defined as hailstones with a diameter of at least two inches, which is about the size of a lime.

Big hailstones are expensive. Replacing a hail-damaged roof can cost $15,000 or more, though homeowners;' insurance usually covers that. (On that note, a spoiler:  Look for an upcoming piece on how State Farm is allegedly doing everything they can to not pay for hail damaged roofs).

Fixing a hail-damaged vehicle can cost several thousand dollars, but if the damage is severe enough, insurers will just total the car.  

Hail costs an estimated $15 billion in damage to homes, buildings, vehicles and crops each year in the U.S. 

Hail-prone cities and their surrounding suburbs continue to expand, providing more targets for potential gorilla hail. That's helping to cause hail costs to spiral upward. 

NOT SO RARE?

It seemed fortunate that "gorilla hail," with stones the size of baseballs, softballs, grapefruit or even worse, was considered relatively rare. But maybe not. 

New research in recent years suggest "gorilla hail" has always been more common than we thought. And super giant hail might be becoming more frequent. 

It was thought that hail stones six inches in diameter or greater were exceedingly rare. But new research suggests maybe those gargantuan icy meteors aren't quite as rare as we thought.  

Per Washington Post:

"'I think six inches plus is happening on a yearly basis,' said Victor Gensini, a professor at Northern Illinois University, in a recent interview. "I think it's a matter of who's finding it, who's looking for it. When you're actually out there looking for it, four-plus-inch hail is maybe not that rare."

Most of these giant hailstones are happening in fairly remote areas, where people aren't around to observe them before they melt. Or, since such large hail is so dangerous, and maybe accompanied by ferocious, damaging winds or even tornadoes, people who would otherwise find them are wisely hunkering down in basements and storm shelters.

Besides, most big hail stones shatter upon impact. To find these hail stones, you need a road that happens to lead where the biggest hail stones landed, Gensini said. Most hail falls over open fields. Good luck finding the biggest stones before they start to melt. 

Thunderstorms that produce gargantuan hail can't actually have too much water in therm. Storms with incredible amounts of rain tend not to produce the biggest hail. Bigger hail also seems to fall when a small storm merges with a large supercell that is already producing hail.

The bad news from all this research is that future storms might produce bigger hail, thanks, once again, to climate change. 

The Washington Post tells us:

"Gensini published a paper in 2024 that suggests less hail will occur overall, ut there will be more instances of giant hail. Why? Warming temperatures in the lower atmosphere will melt some of the small hailstones. Yet big stones fall fast enough through the warmer lower atmosphere that they have little time to melt. And with more thunderstorm fuel overall thanks to a warming world, there could be more of them."

We will probably get more and more new reports of giant hail simply from better technology. At least 90 percent of hailstones shatter or break on impact, and the rest start to melt immediately.  

Researchers are starting to use photogrammetry, a technique that uses trigonometry to estimate the sizeof objects caught on camera. (And you thought there was no use for trigonometry when you were back in high school!)

A hail specialist at Penn State used the technique to estimate the size of a gorilla hailstone that fell on an Argentinian with in 2018.  He found the hailstone to be 7.4 to 9.3 inches in diameter. A woman found a 7.1 inch diameter hailstone just after the storm ended, collaborating the photogrammetry. The woman's hailstone was a bit smaller as it had already started to melt.

Gorilla hail is terrifying and incredibly destructive. You don't want to get caught in any of these storm. Here's hoping you don't experience one of those storms! 

  

 

 

 

 

For A Change, A Company Does It Right By Employees As A Tornado Loomed

Extreme tornado damage in an industrial area of 
Mineral Wells, Texas that was hit by a tornado
late last month. One employer, Ventamatic, 
took watches and warnings seriously, so they
sent employees home ahead of the storm,
which very likely saved lives. 

 I've written in the past cases in which companies seemed indifferent to their employees as tornadoes bore down on their workplaces. 

For a change of pace, we have a case in which a company protected its employees from a tornado. 

That nobody died is a testament to great warnings from the National Weather Service, a company that enacted its emergency plan and kept a close eye on the weather.

The company in question is Ventamatic which has, or at least had, a manufacturing plant in Mineral Wells, Texas. 

 Company officials on the afternoon of April 28 first noticed a dangerous supercell storm when it was near Wichita Falls, about 80 miles northwest of Mineral Wells. 

An area of Texas, including Mineral Wells, went under a tornado watch, since the supercell was heading in the general direction of tha city. So Ventamatic officials sent all the 120 workers home, because the homes had better protection from tornadoes than the plant. 

Plus, removing the workers meant there wasn't concentration of people at risk. Sending the workers home dispersed them into a wide area.  Many workers went home to houses that were ultimately not in the path of the tornado ,and not damaged.  

Supervisors at the plant also contacted the next shift telling them to hold off on coming in until the bad weather passed. 

The tornado struck the complex as an EF-3 with winds of up to 145 mph. A total of 132 homes and businesses suffered damage.  Nine houses were a total loss and 12 others had major damage. The Ventamatic plant was decimated. 

Aerial video of the industrial complex housing Ventamatic showed leveled buildings and sheet metal strewn everywhere.  The sheet metal must have been swirling wildly in the tornado, enough to cut a person in half if they're hit. 

But there was nobody at Ventamatic to hit.  

Mineral Wells Mayor Reagan Johnson called management a "true, true lifesaver for the community. Incredible that he did that.......Just knowing even what that employer did, the forethought to do that, the awareness, what a hero,!" according to KDFW Fox 4. 

 It appears not all businesses in the manufacturing complex were sent home.  Unconfirmed reports on Facebook indicated employees at a factory called Parker Hannifin were taken by surprise by the tornado and didn't even have time to reach the safest part of the building, which was the bathrooms. 

They instead huddled in a break room, and managed to escape serious injury.

Bottom line, Ventamatic officials were weather aware, had an emergency plan that included what to do when a tornado threatens, and they followed that plan. Perfect!

That contrasts with past incidents involving workplaces and tornadoes. In December, 2021, a huge tornado rampaged through western Kentucky, approaching the town of Mayfield. Workers at Mayfield Consumer Products, a candle factory claim in a lawsuit that supervisors repeated turned down employees requests to go home and hunker down with families, which they believed to be safer than the factory building. 

Some workers left anyway. 

In the end, the powerful tornado leveled the factory, killing nine people and injuring several  more. At last report, the lawsuit had not been resolved. 

On the same night as the Mayfield tornado, another twister struck an Amazon warehouse in Edwardsville, killing six workers.

As I wrote in December, 2021, a few days after the tornadoes: 

"Tornado warnings for Edwardsville were issued at least 20 minutes before the tornado hit. However, Amazon managers either didn't take the warning seriously, didn't know what to do with them, or more depressingly if true, prioritized production over worker safety. "

In that same tornado outbreak an Amazon driver heard tornado warnings and sirens and wanted to head back to the warehouse or a safer place. A vehicle is pretty much the least safe place to be in a tornado. 

The driver's dispatcher radioed back, "If you decide to come back that choice is yours. But I can tell you it won't be viewed as for your own safety. The safest practice is to stay exactly where you are. If you decide to return with your packages it will be viewed as you refusing your route, which will ultimately end with you not having a job tomorrow. The sirens are just a warning."

Yes! The sirens are a warning! Meaning get to a safe place immediately. But it's all about profits to keep Amazon's multibillionaire owner happy, isn't it?

The issue isn't just tornadoes. 

During Hurricane Helene, supervisors allegedly didn't allow workers to leave the Impact Plastics factory in Erwin, Tennessee as flood waters rose outside. They weren't allowed to leave until it was too late. 

Twelve people were swept away in the floodwaters and all but five of them died.  

Meanwhile, back in Mineral Wells, there were other success stories that prevented tornado deaths. 

Johnson, the Mineral Wells  mayor, said a teenager was home alone but had the presence of mind to hide in a closet as the tornado bore down on their house.  Probably because tornado safety is drilled into Midwestern kids' heads. 

In another case, a husband got into a closet 10 seconds before the tornado hit because his wife was relentlessly nagging him to do so. 

"She's getting a good anniversary present this year, I hope," Johnson said.