Minor Storm Brought Vermont Road Issues, More Ice To Come Then Huge "False Spring"

From Facebook. Things got snarled up in the snow
yesterday in far southern Vermont. I believe this is
Route 9 in Searsburg. 

Our little storm last night wasn't really that bad or memorable, but it proved it doesn't take much to make a mess. 

Yesterday afternoon, it looks like they had to shut down Route 9 over the mountains between Bennington and Brattleboro because road conditions got so bad so quickly. The roads were pretty awful across southern Vermont during the afternoon commute. 

The snow abruptly came into Burlington last evening. Reports were it was slow going on Interstate 89, not so much because he road was slippery, but because the large snowflakes, blowing erratically in the wind, annoyingly made visibility terrible. 

This morning, Interstate 89 around Milton was seriously backed up due to a crash or crashes, presumably in part because there was lingering slush on the roads. It must have been frustrating with stuck there, with the warm March sunshine streaming through windshields and water from melting snow trickling pass car tires just sitting there in the traffic jam. 

Nice morning today, but Vermont AOT web cam showed
traffic really backed up on Interstate 89 in Milton,
possibly partly due to lingering slush on the
road from last night's burst of snow. 

I don't have much in the way of snowfall reports, but judging from traffic cameras, the expected one to three inches fell, with perhaps locally more in some high elevations. 

Burlington has 1.3 inches. Far northern Vermont missed out, as expected. I only had 0.2 inches here in St. Albans, which had already largely disappeared in the morning sunshine. 

We'll have one more wintry bump in the road before we get the big thaw this weekend that will be our false spring.  I define false spring as the first spell of balmy weather,  usually in late February or March, before winter weather returns. 

Let's get into the daily forecast. There's been a few changes since we last checked in with this yesterday. 

TODAY

Despite what all those people stuck on Interstate 89 thought this morning, today will truly be a nice one. The sun had returned, or was in the process of return, by around 8:30 or so today.

Maple sugar makers might get a decent run today as highs get into the low or even mid 40s. We'll have a fair amount of sunshine as well. 

THURSDAY 

We have some changes to the forecast, mostly in the Champlain Valley. That cold high pressure in Quebec we've been talking about will be taking hold. It looks like the high pressure might be a tad further south in Quebec than first thought. That means  chilly low level air will start to bleed down into the valley. Instead of highs in the low 40s that had been forecast, it'll barely make it to 32 degrees.

The cold air will have trouble making it east of the Greens, so places like Montpelier and St. Johnsbury should still make it at least into the upper 30s. Southern Vermont still looks like they'll see another sap run day with highs passing 40 degrees.

THURSDAY NIGHT/FRIDAY

The fact that the cold air from Quebec is asserting itself a little more is a problem. The next weather disturbance coming along will run into that shallow layer of cold air settling into northern New England while warm air flows in aloft.

There's are classic recipe for freezing rain and sleet. I'm seeing varying scenarios as to how much we'll get. At the moment, it does't look like the icy stuff won't come down hard, but you need just a teeny tiny bit to make things miserable. After hacking the ice off your car to get in, you next need to deal with very slick roads. 

I think the trees and power lines are safe, though. It doesn't look like we'll have enough ice to cause that kind of damage. 

Thursday evening's commute is safe, as we won't have anything worse than thickening clouds then. But Friday morning could be a real mess. 

A couple other things could happen, one of which would help. It's possible the cold high pressure will get so strong that it could deflect all precipitation away from some areas north of Route 2. That' scenario is unlikely, but it's one that I'd love to see. 

The other one is that the warm aloft might erode and turn colder. That, in turn would change precipitation to snow for a time Friday morning. Snow is at least a little better than freezing rain. This scenario is slightly more likely, but not definite. 

By Friday afternoon, temperatures should crawl back above freezing. It looks like the day will just be cloudy, raw and damp. 

FRIDAY NIGHT/SATURDAY

The next wave of rain will arrive Friday night. Or freezing rain, unfortunately. It still might be cold enough east of the Green Mountains for some ice. Increasing south winds west of the Greens should keep things just wet.

Temperatures should rocket upward Saturday afternoon so that it could get into the 50s in some areas. Dew points, a measure of how humid it is, will get into the 40s. That's pretty high for this time of year. 

Snow melts faster with higher humidity, so we might start getting into trouble Saturday and Saturday evening with ice breaking up on rivers, so we'll need to keep an eye on that. One bright spot is the it looks like the rain will be mostly light and sort of on and off. It won't add much to the runoff.

SUNDAY AND BEYOND

It still looks like decidedly springlike weather looks like it's on the way. Sunday looks slightly cooler and definitely less humid than Saturday, so that will probably temporarily slow the melt runoff into the rivers. 

But Monday, Tuesday and possibly Wednesday look interesting. A summer-like Bermuda high will set up, bringing us temperatures that will possibly threaten record highs. And once again bring high humidity for this time of year which just eats up snow. ]\

Whatever snow is left in the valleys will melt super fast, and many low elevations that are now deep in snow will be looking at bare ground by next week. 

Some preliminary data suggests some area rivers might go over their banks, and we'll still have the risks of ice jams. which of course can cause flooding if they dam up rivers in the wrong spots.

Early guesses are we'll go back to wintry reality by the end of next week. Of course, cold snaps tend to start losing their bite this time of year. By no means do I expect any subzero cold to return. Instead, just the usual March schmutz.

New York City Rediscovers Winter,And Not Everybody Is Happy About It

This screen grab of a New York City webcam on Friday 
looked peaceful enough, but some New Yorkers are 
not handling the toughest winter in recent memory
very well. It gets very cold again this weekend. 

Snow and winter cold that just won't go away is driving some New Yorkers batty. 

As many of us know, almost a foot snow and sleet fell on New York City back on January 25 and it has just sat there. Stubbornly. Daring for people to say mean things about it as it turns gray, yellow, slushy and gross. 

Mean things are also being said about the air temperatures, which has been consistently colder than it's been in yeats. 

And those mean things are being said. 

Egged on by the New York Post, a right wing, Murdoch owned publication, New Yorkers, mostly of MAGA ilk are enraged that snow is still narrowing sidewalks, making parking difficult and is just plain nasty to look at, now that it's been sitting around getting dirty for more than a week.

Trash bags are still out there too, as the sanitation department focused on clearing snow, so some trash pickups were delayed.

All that snow I'm sure is frustrating to New Yorkers. But it's mostly really about the Post and MAGA trying to do anything to take leftie Mayor Zohran Mamdani down a peg. Because he's - gasp! a democratic socialist. 

Hizzoner probably hasn't done a perfect job with this winter storm. No mayor would. But from my vantage point, he's done pretty well from what I can see. But what do I know? I'm just a hick from Vermont who has plenty of room to throw snow out of the way if I need to. 

The complaints seem to center on the fact that in past big storms the snow disappeared from the streets pretty quickly after big storms. 

Which is true. 

But the whiners don't seem to understand the concept of thawing. 

The temperature in New York has remained near or below freezing since the storm hit on January 25 and 26. Most past storms featured warmer, thawing weather right after the storm.

The complainers point to a 27 inch blizzard on January 23, 2016. That one was more than twice as deep as this year's snowfall, but it disappeared fairly quickly. It was above freezing in New York every day after that snowstorm. It was 47 degrees on January 27, 56 degrees on January 31 and a toasty 60 on February 1

Snow depth fell to just six inches within a week after the storm. By February 2, only a trace remained. 

It's not like everybody is complaining. A lot of New Yorkers just say fughetaboutit

On Threads, a New Yorker very reasonably wrote: "All these people talking about yellow snow and dirty snow. Garbage piled up. This is how it has always been after a snowstorm. For decades. It doesn't make it right. It just makes it true. Don't blame Mamdani. Don't blame the MTA. Understand that it takes time to remove snow in a city this size."

Other people got deliciously sarcastic on line:

"After TWO WEEKS there's STILL snow in Central Park, New York City! When will Mamdani get rid of it! Another epic fail!" 

The writer made clear this was indeed sarcasm, so other people mockingly piled on poor Mayor Mamdani. 

"Why hasn't Mamdani made the temperature go above 40 degrees yet?"

"And when will that monster finally put the leaves back on the trees?"

"Socialism brings snow. Why do you think Russia has so much snow?"

"Snow never existed before he was mayor. He cast a spell to create this thing called snow."

"Wasn't he to blame for the blizzard of '96?"

Mamdani was four years old when the blizzard of 1996, so it of course makes perfect sense that this notorious storm was his fault. 

CLEANUP CONTINUES

 New York has alternate side parking rules in which people need to park on one side of the street some days, and other side on different days. This allows for street cleaning.

The city suspended the rules after the big snowstorm on January 25-26. But the suspension ends on Super Bowl Sunday - this weekend -  and quite a few cars are buried under snow and ice. Those buried cars will need to be moved by then, or there will be towing and serious expenses for those car owners. 

It was fairly mild by this winters standards in New York Thursday and Friday which softened the ice encasing the cars a little. That was everybody's last chance to dig out their vehicles. With another intense blast of Arctic cold surging into New York, the ice around those cars is no doubt hard as concrete again. Good luck getting rid of that.   

I'm sure there will be plenty more whining when the expensive parking tickets and towing hit on Monday. 

NO FERRIES

Ferry service on the Hudson and East Rivers have been suspended for a week and that's not going to change anytime soon.  So much ice has built up around Manhattan island that it's too unsafe for ferries to operate.

The ice diminished around Manhattan this week, but it's still there. And those frigid conditions forecast for the weekend mean that you're not going to take the famous Staten Island Ferry or any other ferries for awhile yet if you're around New York. 

At least New York is in for a minor break, anyway. After this cold snap clears out, daytime temperatures most of this week will be in the 30s. 

Lake Champlain Ice Watch: Not Entirely Frozen Yet!

Visible satellite photo of Vermont and surrounding areas
this afternoon. Clear skies allowed us to see the ice 
situation on Lake Champlain. The dark blue area is
where the lake is not frozen yet. 

 Nope, Lake Champlain is not completely frozen over yet. 

It got clear enough for visible satellite photos to give us a good view today.  As you can see in the photo here, there's a large blue patch in the middle of the lake. That's open water. 

The northern half of the lake is solidly frozen. It's been that way for days or weeks, depending on exactly where you are. The narrow, shallower southern end of the lake is frozen over, too.

If the lake completely freezes, it will probably be at least a few days before that happens. More ice will very likely get manufactured tonight, since temperatures are forecast to go slightly below zero. But a light breeze will also probably continue all night, so that might slow the process down. 

Temperatures will moderate into the low to mid 20s by day and single digits to around 10 above until the end of the week. I'm guessing that also won't be cold enough to completely seal off the lake. 

Another blast of Arctic air is due next weekend, and that'll bring daytime highs back down to the single numbers and overnight lows well below zero.

We'll see whether that will be enough to finally freeze over the lake for the first time since 2019. 

 

FEMA Struggling With How To Keep ICE Out of Ice In Winter Storm Messaging

That now-famous image of an ICE agent slipping
and falling on the ice in Minneapolis earlier this
month. FEMA officials have reportedly been
banned from using the word "ice" when 
referring to the giant winter storm now in
progress because the word could generate
mockery of ICE agents. They have a point. 

 Our government has gotten tragically, absurdly silly, and we have the latest examples, thanks in part to our latest winter storm. 

The biggest danger with this storm is ice. Freezing rain is or will be coating trees and power lines from Texas to Georgia to Virginia. 

This will lead to power outages, tree destruction, blocked roads and carbon monoxide deaths from poorly placed or maintained generators.  

The problem is all that ice out there - as in frozen water - and all that ICE out there - the gestapo-like storm troopers terrorizing people in places like Minnesota and Maine - are ripe for social media ridicule if you put them all together.  

Here's the silliness, as CNN explains:

"Homeland Security officials have urged disaster response staff at the Federal Emergency Management Agency to avoid using the word 'ice' in public messaging about the massive winter storm barreling toward much of the United States, according to two sources familiar with the directive."

CNN says that officials should reference "freezing rain" and not "ice" in their public statements. The fear is using the word "ice" to describe the storm will sow confusion or online mockery.

All I can say to that is, "Oh, honey, there's going to be mockery no matter what you do."

I can agree with Homeland Security officials who think that if FEMA released innocuous statements like "Keep off the roads if you see ice." it would lead on social media to lots of laughs and giggles and pointed arguments and anger toward Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents.  o 

Whether or not FEMA uses the word "ice," I bet there will be memes galore about ICE agents in winter weather, if they're not there already. Mockery is one of the best weapons against tyranny.  I imagine that widely circulated photo and video of that ICE agent slipping and falling on Minneapolis ice earlier this month will get a lot of traction, pardon the pun. 

A FEMA spokesperson denied the "freezing rain" directive and said CNN's reporting is "a desperate ploy for clickbait."

Still, early indications are that FEMA is avoiding saying the dreaded "i" word in their public messages regarding the storm.

Since Thursday, FEMA has posted several statements and pieces of advice regarding the storm on the social media platform X.  None that I could find used the word "ice." However, FEMA did repost a National Weather Service statement that referenced "widespread heavy snow & dangerous ice accumulations."

If only one kind of ice, the kind that falls from the sky or freezes on the ground, was the worst thing we were facing this winter.  

Minnesotans Find Ally In Frigid Weather In Battle Against ICE

The now-infamous image of the ICE agent slipping
and falling on an icy Minneapolis street has become
a symbol of how winter-tough Minnesotans
are enduring the battle against ICE
oppression much better than the federal
forces in town to take away all the immigrants

The Battle of Minnesota between federal ICE agents and the good people of Minneapolis and other cities rages on. 

The citizens of frigid Minnesota have discovered they have one key ally in their struggle against the excesses of these often out of control federal agents. Winter. Including the regular slippery, not Gestapo ice, as in frozen water. 

Minneapolis has so far had the kind of winter we've had here in Vermont. Lots of freeze/thaw cycles and bouts of freezing rain to make everything even more interesting underfoot.

Judging from the videos of ICE agents slipping and falling on the ice, much to the delight of their many critics, I think the boots issued to ICE agents weren't exactly made for a Minnesota winter. 

Very much like Vermonters, Minnesotans know instinctively how to deal with winter. How to dress for it, how to embrace the cold. As The Other 98% wrote on Facebook:

"Beyond the spectacle of agents in tactical gear skidding on black ice, this moment reveals something deeper about the confrontation: A clash between a highly militarized federal apparatus and a community rooted in lived experience.

Many protestors have come equipped with insulated gear, boots with traction spikes and the kind of winter sense from years of Minnesota cold rather than federal training manuals. That difference - lived winter resilience versus bureaucratic enforcement - is playing out in real time on city streets."

Demonstrators are also using winter as a tactical tool against ICE, and against at least one right wind agitator who came to Minneapolis, and quickly fled. 

A constant hot spot in the Minneapolis unrest is the Whipple Federal Building, where ICE agents are headquartered. The weather turned much colder in the past few days in Minnesota. Protestors dumped water on the pavement near the building to form ice that could hinder, or at least annoy ICE agents. 

ICE ended up arresting four people, who they called "agitators" for "refusing to disperse." It appears ICE was irritated that they (allegedly) "threw objects, shouted profanities and endangered  the public by pouring water on the roads to create icy, hazardous conditions."

Judging from those ICE falling on ice videos I mentioned, the water on road idea just might be effective. 

On Saturday, Jake Lang, a right-wing nut and pardoned January 6 rioter, tried to lead an anti-immigration demonstration in Minneapolis, but hundreds of Minnesotans did not want to put up with his garbage. 

So, they chased Lang out of town, throwing punches at him, which I'm a little concerned about, and spraying him with water from squirt guns, which I'm not even a little concerned about. Temperatures hovered near 10 degrees at the time, and Lang did not appear dressed for the weather. 

Although video showed a little blood coming out of the back of Lang's head, he reportedly was not seriously injured. But I bet he was damn cold. 

Meanwhile, Trump is toying with the idea of invoking the Insurrection Act to deploy 1,500 federal troops to Minnesota. 

Critics, and there are a lot of 'em, say doing that would just escalate the uproar over ICE raids, at least some of which look legally dubious. It also appears ICE agents' interactions with protestors aren't always kosher, either.

In any event, the Pentagon is ordering about 1,500 active duty soldiers to get ready for what might end up as a deployment to Minnesota. The soldiers are with the Army's Alaska-based 11th Airborne Division, which specializes in cold-weather operations. 

 It looks like the Trump administration is beginning to notice the difficulty of dealing with a northern winter.  

Minnesota weather is now frigid and getting colder. Temperatures are only in the single digits with snow falling today. It'll be below zero tonight. An even stronger Arctic blast is due in Minnesota by next weekend.  

People out in the streets are rooting for the Arctic blast. The New York Times quoted Chris Foreman, a military veteran who has joined the protestors near the Whipple Federal Building: "I want it to get cold.....People know that a lot of these ICE guys are from the South. They're coming into a different environment and they're not used to it."

Frigid weather tends to slow things down. I hope that the Arctic cold will bring the temperature down figuratively as well as literally. 

Why Trying To Save Money During The Winter Can Be A Bad Idea

Here's what the top of a washing machine in Quebec 
looked like after they shut off the heat in the apartment
while away to "save  money" The pipes burst, and
this was some of the result

Heating a home in the winter is expensive, we all know that. 

We're all torn between keeping warm and affording to keep the furnace on. But somebody in Quebec took the desire to save money way too far. 

In Trois-Rivieres, Quebec, along the St. Lawrence River about halfway between Montreal and Quebec City, an apartment tenant recently left for an extended period, probably on vacation.  

That tenant apparently thought to themselves,  "Why pay for heat in my apartment when I'm not going to be there?"

It appears they said this. In January. In Quebec. 

You guessed it! The inevitable happens. Pipes froze and burst. The toilet cracked, sending water through the floor into the living space below.  The results are captured in a video at the bottom of this post. 

Pretty much everything ended up being covered in ice inside that building. The landlord said the ice on the kitchen floor was nearly a foot thick. The washing machine looked like an elaborate ice sculpture. Clothes folded atop the dryer were just one big frozen mass. 

Put it this way, the apartment "ice castle" in Trois-Rivieres is not nearly as grand as Elsa's castle in the movie "Frozen," as the CTV reporter dryly notes. 

The landlord seemed to be taking the mess in pretty good humor, if we can judge from his CTV interview. He said the whole apartment will need to be ripped apart and rebuilt. That is, after the ice eventually melts. He's got heaters in there to bring a spring thaw to the apartment, but as you'll see in the video, it'll take awhile.

The former tenant whose name is on the lease was formally evicted earlier this month after having moved out several months ago without paying rent. It's unclear who was living there and turned off the heat just prior to their departure. 

The "ice castle" apartment is part of a triplex, but the tenants living in the other two units within the building were not affected.

Here's the video. Click on this link to view, or if you see the image below, click on that. 

Rain Changing To Snow Early Today In Vermont, Winter Is Back

Traffic cam of Interstate 89 in Brookfield, which is close to 
the highest elevation on the Interstate has already 
picked up a few inches of snow, making for
hazardous travel. Rain was changing to snow
in lower elevations as of 7:30, so this
mornings commute is a little iffy.

 As of 7:15 a.m., road conditions were deteriorating in northern Vermont as rain was changing to snow and temperatures were falling to and then below the freezing point. 

Rain flipped to snow shortly before 7 a.m. here in St. Albans. Places in central Vermont have already gone to snow, too. The southern and central Champlain Valley and most of southern parts of the state were still raining. 

Nobody in Vermont will get much snow out go this. Northern New York was the big winner with this. 

For Vermont, whatever snow we get is a timing problem. The changeover to snow for many of us is hitting when it's time to drive to work or school. 

As temperatures dip below freezing as the snow continues to fly, you know that means road conditions won't be great everywhere. It was still raining around Burlington as of 7 a.m., but we'll see how long tha lasts,   

It's the usual admonition to drive slowly, and leave plenty of room between you and the car in front of you.

Accidents are already happening. Police and fire trucks just blasted past my house in St. Albans as of 7:15 a.m. Apparently, there's a rollover crash just up the hill from my house. 

Where it's snowing, it will continue lightly well into today. I don't have any official snow reports yet, but judging from traffic cameras, it looks like areas well away from Lake Champlain in Vermont had picked up a dusting to an inch in low elevations in northern Vermont and maybe two or as much as three inches higher up.  

Rainy areas will be snowy soon. Additional snowfall looks like it might amount to  about one to 2,5 inches in the northwestern quarter of Vermont and less than an inch in most other places.

The Green Mountains should get a two to four inch dusting to partly make up for yesterday's thawing. 

Light snow should continue in parts of northern Vermont through the afternoon. The southern Connecticut River Valley will manage just flurries, if that.

COLDER PATTERN ARRIVES

The thaw is officially OVER. 

Six of the past seven days in Burlington got to at least 40 degrees. It's going to be quite awhile before it's 40 again. 

Later this morning and this afternoon, the real cold air will catch up to us. Temperatures were only slowly falling through the low and mid 30s in Vermont right before dawn. Over in New York, in the western Adirondacks and St. Lawrence Valley, it was already getting into the teens as of 7 a.m.

That air will soon be in Vermont to solidify the ice on the sidewalks and untreated roads. By the time you go to bed, temperatures should be in the teens for most of us, and down in the single number stop near 10 by dawn tomorrow. 

That frigid weather pattern I talked about yesterday is still on its way. Usually, the initial slap from these Arctic outbreaks is pretty tame when we get into these Nanook of the North weather regimes.

That's the case this time. Temperature will recover to the low 20s Friday, and low 30s Saturday. They'll probably settle into the mid and upper 20s Sunday and Monday afternoons. So, not bad!

Between tonight and Monday, we'll have chances of snow showers, but we won't see any big piles of snow The snow cover in the valleys will remain thin for awhile after our thaw. 

Most of next week looks pretty frigid. Early guesses put high temperatures most days from Tuesday onward at around 10 degrees, maybe 15 degrees in the warm spots, with lows near zero. Chances of snow showers will continue through the week, but prospects of a big dump of snow are looking pretty bleak for now. 

There might be a brief break in the chill next weekend before it turns really cold again.

One encouraging thing is I might have been right about some of the models backing off on how cold it will get as we get closer to the events. This is looking less and less like near record cold as we head through the rest of the month. Instead, we just face annoying cold..

That means mostly below normal temperatures, but maybe not the kind of extremes we saw back in the 1970s and even early 1990s, when we'd get into the mid 20s to mid 30s below zero.

Fingers crossed that we'll avoid that! 

Saturday Evening Vermont Storm Update: Still A Mess; Trends Slightly Warmer

The air might be a little warmer with this storm than
forecasters were thinking this morning, so snow
totals were cut back a bit overnight. This map
only covers through 1 p.m. Sunday. More snow
should add to the totals Sunday night. 

 After a long trend toward colder and colder forecasts for tonight storm in Vermont and surrounding  areas, the latest forecast has more or less bumped up temperatures by a degree or two. 

This means some of the broader, warmer valleys might see more rain than anything else. In those places, says the National Weather Service, it could start of as rain this evening, maybe get cold enough for  some mixed precipitation for a while, the perhaps going back to rain, before things taper off Sunday morning. 

Colder areas, like mid and high elevations and the Northeast Kingdom, are more likely to see more snow and not so much rain. But it will still probably turn into mixed precipitation even there. 

The National Weather Service has cut back overnight snow totals in the Northeast Kingdom down to one to as much as five inches. The broader Champlain Valley could see an inch of snow perhaps less, because of the anticipated mix with rain. Most areas south of Route 4 should see little or even no snow in the warmer spots, like Bennington. 

Freezing rain is still in the card for many areas. The most likely areas for freezing rain continue to be in the southern Green Mountains, southern Adirondacks and the Monadnocks of southern New Hampshire. 

Those three areas areas are still under winter weather advisories overnight. The amount of ice accumulation has been cut back slightly to a tenth of an inch or less in the places under the winter advisory. 

That means we won't have trouble with power lines and trees, but the roads will surely be scary. Don't drive overnight if you don't have to. 

Anywhere in Vermont, roads will be iffy overnight Just keep that in mind if you want to go out partying or something.

There's still a really high bust potential with this forecast. Don't be surprised if you end up surprised one way or another by tomorrow morning,  

Temperatures will tend to start falling Sunday afternoon as the winds begin to pick up. Snow showers will start re-blossom as well. At least in northern Vermont and the mountains. Northern and central Vermont look like they might pick up two to four inches of snow from this second phase, mostly Sunday night. 

The central and southern Champlain Valley, and the low lands of southern Vermont will pretty much miss out on the Sunday night snow. 

On the other hand some of the central and northern Green Mountains could do really well. Between this evening and Monday, those areas could receive six or more inches of snow.  

Weekend Vermont Storm Looking Even Colder, Snow Chances Increase

Slate colored clouds looking west from St. Albans, Vermont 
this morning portended some rain showers moving in
by this afternoon. 

 The weather forecast for Vermont today looks pretty easy to figure out. For later in the weekend, not so much. 

The trends for the Saturday night and Sunday storm are continuing to look colder. It's now looking like at least northern parts of the state might get more snow than rain out of it. 

More on that in a minute. First we have to get through today. 

TODAY/TOMORROW

Roads across Vermont outside of the Champlain Valley were slick in many areas. Moist air and some of the remnants of melting snow froze overnight, leaving black ice on the roadways. That problem will ease later this morning as temperatures rise above freezing.

The first of two storms we're dealing with will go by to our west today. That ensures everybody in Vermont will see rain. Not much, though. Rainfall this afternoon and evening should amount to 0.1 to 0.2 inches for most of us. 

Winds will be gusty in places today, especially in the Champlain Valley and across the pond in northern New York.

Snow lovers have one bit of good news today. Record warmth is embracing the southeastern United States today, but it will only be sort of warm here. True, daytime highs in the 40s today will melt some of the snow. Or all of it in places where the snow cover is quite thin in southern Vermont valleys. 

However, the very warmest air won't be able to make it this far north before it gets cut off at the pass by a cold front this evening. The cold front is no powerhouse. By morning, temperatures will be close to 30 degrees, which is a mild morning by January standards

Saturday will be the stereotypical calm before the storm. Some sun might break out in the morning for a bit, but it will cloud over in the afternoon. Highs will be in the 30s.

THE STORM

First of all, some background. It's a pretty dynamic system. For evidence, I present you with the four reported out of season tornadoes that touched down in Oklahoma yesterday. They weren't huge, but still.

Today. more severe storms and maybe some tornadoes, are in the forecast for the Deep South.  Meteorologist are also expecting some heavy rain and flooding in the Gulf Coast states. 

The good news for us in Vermont is the deepest moisture, the most chaotic part of the atmosphere  and the heaviest precipitation will zoom up from the South, through the Mid-Atlantic States and then offshore via the southern New England coast. Meaning, the torrential stuff will miss us. 

Still, though, we will get our share of precipitation, even if it's not torrential. We're still expecting a double-barrel storm. Once center will go up through the Great Lakes, the other will take shape near southern New England. 

The southern New England one keeps looking a little stronger with each run of the computer models, so that would tend to keep the cold air locked in better. 

Of course, temperatures throughout most of the atmosphere during this event will be touch and go between snow and a mix. So don't take the following prediction as gospel quite yet.

But as it stands now, it looks like places north of Route 2 in Vermont might see mostly snow, with just a little mix of ice or rain in there. Total snow accumulation through Sunday morning up there would be in the two to four inch range. 

Between Route 2 and 4, there would be more of a mix, so total snow accumulation might be in the one or two inch range, with maybe a slight glaze of ice.

South of Route 4, it will be mostly rain with maybe some ice and a few snowflakes. 

Again, the forecasts are still in flux, so expect some changes. 

SUNDAY NIGHT AND BEYOND

The remnants of the part of the storm that ended up in the Great Lakes is forecast to come through Sunday night. That would spread another two or three inches of snow across northern Vermont, with maybe a little more in the mountains. That Sunday night burst of snow could leave one to three inches of snow in central Vermont, with less than that across the south. 

The first half of the upcoming week still looks like it will be on the mild side, with daytime highs Tuesday and Wednesday probably getting a little above freezing.

But, a long spell of cold to bitter cold weather looks like it will start during the second half of next week. Chances are rising that the Arctic air could last through the end of January.    

Monday Evening Vermont Storm Update: Everything To Freeze Up As Arctic Winds Arrive

Route 5 near Hartland today. Photo by
Isabella Belisle, via Facebook.

The freezing rain part of our storm is just about over, but we now get to look forward to all the remaining slush and water turning to hard, slippery ice again. We will also get to not-so-joyfully experience crashing temperatures, gusty winds and sharp, almost painful wind chills. 

Most places got between 0.15 to 0.25 inches of ice that coated everything outdoors. Many of us in the Champlain Valley never saw it because it changed to plain rain a little ahead of sunrise, before most of us got up. In other places, it kept going. 

The highest ice accumulation I saw was 0.5 inches in Warren, 0.4 inches in Chittenden and 0.38 inches in Cabot and Chelsea.

Vermont State Police said that from Sunday evening to 11 a.m. Monday they responded to 92 weather-related crashes across the state, three of which resulted in injuries. Of those crashes 29 of them happened on Interstate highways and the rest were on secondary roads. 

Power outages across Vermont continued to rise through the morning peaking at around 10:45 a.m today. As of 4:15 p.m or so, outages were down to only about 700, mostly in east-central Vermont.  

Overall precipitation amounts were healthy, too. Most of central and northern Vermont received between 0.75 and one inch of rain and melted ice. Far southern parts of the state saw a little over an inch. 

Since not that much snow cover melted, the water content of it really increased. It's going to be that crunchy gross stuff if you walk through it tomorrow. 

LOOKING AHEAD

Traffic cam grab showed ice still on the trees along
Interstate 89 in Brookfield. As winds increase tonight,
some of the weighted down branches might break,
spawning new power outages. 

At 3 p.m, shortly before the cold front began to press into Vermont,   it had gotten above freezing almost everywhere in Vermont, according to reports. 

There were almost definitely cold hollows east of the Green Mountains that were still below freezing. 

It was 32 degrees in Eden. Other places, like Springfield and Lyndonville, were still at 33 degrees. Most of the rest of the state was only in the mid-30s.    

Traffic camera images in a few spots showed ice still weighing down the trees. I notices it when I did spot checks on Route 302 in Topsham, Interstate 89 in Brookfield and Route 11 in Winhall.

I'm sure ice is still on trees in a lot of other places. I bring this up because the wind will get pretty noticeable as we go through the evening. By later tonight and tomorrow, a lot of us will experience gusts over 30 mph. Maybe 40 mph in a few spots. 

Those winds could knock down a few more ice-laden branches, which would trigger a few more power outages. I don't expect anything too widespread, but keep your devices charged anyway, especially if the tree are all icy outside. 

If you still have ice encasing your car, try to get out there right away and scrape it off before it gets below freezing. Waiting until it gets really cold will make the job really hard. Remember to get the ice of all of your vehicle. If not, you'll be liable for damages if a slab of ice flies off your car or  truck and hits the person in back of you on the highway. 

If you're looking for replacement snow, especially powder after this icy episode, you're pretty much out of luck. Most places will see an inch per less of snow tonight and tomorrow. For the most part, it will be just nuisance snow showers for the rest of the week. The mountains might pick ups few inches, but that's about it. 

It'll get down to 10 degrees, give or take by tomorrow morning and stay in the teens all day. 

Obviously, as noted,  any standing water or slush on your driveway, the roads, and sidewalks will harden into ice tonight and make things treacherous in spots for the foreseeable future. 

Here's why: It's going to stay cold through the upcoming weekend and probably beyond.  I'll get into how cold the week will be and why this is happening in tomorrow morning's post.  

 

ICE Detainees Ironically Face Heat Risks

ICE detention centers are more likely than other jails
and prisons to be in hot parts of the nation. ICE
is allegedly holding detainees in dangerously
hot conditions. 

The word play is ironic, and infuriating. 

According to a Washington Post analysis by Amudalat Ajasa and Daniel Wolfe: 

 "Detainees at U.S Immigration and Customs Enforcement facilities may be more vulnerable to extreme heat exposure than people housed in federal, state and county prisons, according to a Washington Post analysis, and this disparity is likely to grow as ICE expands the nation's immigration system."

ICE expects to double the number of people it can hold from about 55,000 to more than 170,000.

Meanwhile, ICE facilities are disproportionately in hotter parts of the nation. According to WaPo's analysis:

"The facility endure an average of 29 days of dangerous heat per year - 11 more than other prisons in the federal, state and county leave. The hottest 10 percent of ICE facilities experience an average of 93 days of unhealthy temperatures each year."

Advocates, watchdog agencies and others report lots of problems with air conditioning in detention centers, at least according to the detainees who told them about the issues. Comprehensive data on the temperatures in those detention centers are not available. 

WaPo was able to compile reports and some Congressional oversight reports to glean some information. 

A 2016 DHS report on private immigrations detention centers found that detainees at every facility that was investigated detainees complained of problems with heat and cooling. Unannounced inspections at ICE facilities found that staffers "struggled to comply" with detention standards "related to environmental and health safety. 

Sen. Dick Durbin (D-Ill) reported lots of trouble and overheating at two Florida ICE facilities he visited in June. 

WaPo's Ajasa and Wolfe also got into the Eloy Detention Center, which is 60 miles south of Phoenix, Arizona. They wrote:

"In a June letter, Rep. Yassamin Ansari, D-Az, pressed DHS and ICE officials about conditions at Eloy following a visit to the detention center. The letter included allegations that detainees ha been ordered to walk laps in a courtyard for hours until they were dizzy and ill. 

'Detainees described overcrowded, moldy cells, forces and dehumanizing marches outside in the Arizona heat, constant berating from guards conditions worse tha prison,' Ansari said in a statement at the time of her visit."

In statements to an immigration and refugee advocacy group, two detainees said they'd use wet rags and damp underclothes to cool themselves because the air condition units there in the middle of the desert would go out for a week or two or more at a time. Other detainees said air conditioning in some cells never worked at all. 

DHS denies there were problems with air conditioning at Eloy.  

I know a lot of readers here will say:  "So what! They're getting what they deserve!"  

Well, no. 

Definitely, let's get rid of the alleged criminals and rapists and gang members the Trump Administration said were among the migrants in the U.S. We don't want those dangerous people  here. 

But this used to be a nation of due process. You find out whether individuals are indeed as nasty and alleged, and then we deport and/or give them prison sentences. 

But they're rounding up what seems to be immigrants who are trying to do the right thing, take the legal paths to citizenship, and just throwing 'em all in detention centers. Mostly because Stephen Miller doesn't like brown people. 

Apparently, Miller, and the rest of the Trump administration seem intent on using our summertime heat as one method of torture. 

Cruelty is the point. 

Illinois Disaster Appeal Rejection Shows Once Again Trump Puts Loyalty Above All Else

Flooding in Chicago this past July. Donald Trump is
blocking disaster aid to Illinois, probably mostly
because he doesn't like the state's governor. 

Donald Trump is not liking the Illinois governor, and he's taking it out on flood victims in the state. 

The Trump administration turned down another request from Illinois to help the state recover from severe flash floods in July. That, according to the Washington Post, is despite a recent assessment detailing the the widespread damage and financial losses associated with the disaster. 

White House spokeswoman Abigail Jackson in a statement tried to paint the Illinois detail as fiscal responsibility. "Gone are the days of rubber stamping FEMA recommendations," Jackson huffed, saying the Trump administration is "committed to empowering and working with State and federal governments to invest in their own resilience before disaster strikes, making response less urgent and recovery less prolonged."

In other words, states must somehow looked into their crystal balls, determine when and what kind of disasters will strike in the future and cough up the millions of dollars they don't have to do these mythical resiliency projects.

Of course, few believe Trump is trying to help Illinois.

First of all, Illinois is a blue state. More importantly, Trump is feuding with Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker, because the governor objects to Trump's idea of sending  the National Guard deployment in and around Chicago and legally dubious ICE arrests (some would say kidnappings) of people in Illinois. 

Trump, ever the statesman, keeps insulting Pritzker over his weight  (calling the governor a big fat slob on Wednesday) rather than actually dealing with the governor in a rational way. If we're going to get into body shaming, Trump isn't exactly the most svelte character I've ever seen. 

Things have gotten so ridiculous in Illinois that, in early November, Illinois and Federal Emergency Management Agency officials had to remove personnel who were surveilling flood damage in Chicago neighborhoods.

Why? Because immigration agents were patrolling and conducting raids nearby, according to the Washington Post. 

WaPo goes on:

"The decision to halt the disaster assessment teams' work on Nov. 6 came amid an ongoing immigration crackdown in the city, leaving the coordinating state an agency officials worried that FEMA's efforts could put residents as well as surveyors at risk. 

The shift meant about 10 groups of federal, state, county and local workers had to stop work surveying hundreds of homes that sustained heavy water damage in parts of the city hit hard by recent storms - assessments that help the federal agency document disaster impacts, and ca make a case for why an area may need help paying for recovery." 

The whole thing seems suspicious.

Toward the end of October, FEMA's regional administrator told Homeland Security officials about upcoming surveys in the area, as a heads up to avoid conflicts with Homeland Security's immigration crackdowns in Chicago.

As WaPo explained, "It is unclear why immigration agents the ended up in the same place as emergency personnel. Multiple FEMA employees said there were discussions meant to prevent that from happening."

Instead, as FEMA workers set off into a flood-damaged neighborhood, they suddenly saw ICE vehicles and heard whistles - which is a warning people give when ICE comes into an area

So the assessments weren't done. Which might be part of the excuse as to why Trump keeps rejecting disaster aid for Illinois. 

As if the fine citizen of Illinois would suddenly turn MAGA to keep our Orange Cockwomble happy.   

Saturday Evening Vermont Storm Update: Big Thump Of Rain/Mix/Ice Tonight, Big Northern Greens Snowstorm Sun. Night.

Vermont will still get a good thump of rain, freezing rain
ick and schmutz this evening, But this National
Weather Service snow forecast map hints at LOTS
of snow in the Green Mountains Sunday afternoon
through Monday. 

 Just a quick Saturday evening update on that messy storm that is on Vermont's doorstep.

Usually a storm that comes in from the west is pretty uneventful, but this one is super dynamic, so we have a pretty good thump of precipitation on the way. 

It's so dynamic that there's been a lot of thunder and lightning today in western New York and southeastern Ontario. 

After a pretty nice day for mid-November, and compared to what we've had lately, the bad weather will come in fast between 6 and 8 p.m., give or take. 

Whatever comes out of the sky tonight will come down pretty hard, mostly between about 8 p.m. and 2 a.m. The initial part of this storm is short but intense. Rain and melted ice will amount to about a half inch during those hours, so that's substantial for that short time a time frame. 

There's a slight chance you might even hear a rumble of thunder. 

There's still a winter weather advisory for Vermont outside of the Champlain Valley and western Rutland County because some of this will come down as freezing rain.  Roads will get pretty slick. I'd consider abandoning plans to drive around central and eastern Vermont overnight. Or at least plan to take it slow and easy. 

As mentioned this morning the ice will be hit and miss on the roads. Some stretches in the advisory area will be just wet, while a little down the road it'll be glare ice. 

Even in the Champlain Valley, there might be some spots of snow initially and maybe a little sleet and freezing rain mixed in here and there, but it'll be mostly rain overnight. 

As the storm heads east Sunday, winds will really pick up from the west and northwest, gusting to 40 mph in places during the afternoon. Rain showers will turn to snow shower.s 

Most valleys won't have much in the way of rain and snow tomorrow 

However, the central and northern Green Mountains are gearing up for an epic snowstorm. More on that in tomorrow morning's post. 

Coral And Antarctic Sea Ice Climate Change Tipping Points Underway?

Coral bleached out from exposure to too-hot water
If this goes on for too long, the coral dies. 
Coral reefs worldwide are now suffering
from big bleaching events. 

Scientist are eyeing coral reefs and Antarctic ice more than ever lately as the two wildly different parts of nature seem to be headed toward what is known as climate tipping points. 

Climate tipping points are defined as critical thresholds that, when exceeded, can create huge, irreversible changes in ecosystems. 

Recent studies have found that we are at, or about to reach two big climate tipping points. One in the tropics, one in the icy environment around Antarctica. 

All this is part of the second Global Tipping Points report from the University of Exeter's Global Systems Institute in England. The report examines some of the fundamental processes that support life on the planet and how close they are to suffering permanent damage. 

CORAL REEFS

In recent years, we've heard about coral bleaching, in which these organisms lose their colorful appearance and turn ghostly white and die, due to the water temperatures being too hot to support them. 

As climate change warms the oceans, these bleaching or diebacks are becoming more common. 

Now, according to CBS News:

"Scientists have determined that the 'tipping point' for coral reefs begins the global warming reaches 1.2 degrees Celsius, with somewhere between 70 and 90 percent of coral dying when that number climbs to 1.5 degrees. 

About 84 percent of the world's coral reefs had bleaching this year in the most intense event of its kind in history, according to the International Coral Reef Initiative."

Sure, coral reefs are pretty, but most of us won't get to see them. So if they die back, is it really a big deal? 

The answer is a loud yes. Coral reefs provide habitat for about 25 percent of all  underwater species. They also support the livelihoods of about a billion people. 

The past two years have been the warmest recorded on Earth. Though 2025 will be a tiny bit cooler than the previous two years, it won't be by much. With such intense warmth, coral reefs have reached their breaking point. 

ANTARCTIC ICE 

This chart shows pretty stable levels of ice
around Antarctica until around 2000. Then
it began to increase. But starting a
decade ago, the amount of ice began to
drop sharply. 

A paper in the journal Nature describes previously unnoted details of interrelated effects of abruptly melting ice. 

The study in the journal Nature stated: 

"A regime shift has reduced Antarctic sea ice extent far below its natural variability of past centuries, and in some respects its more abrupt, non-linear and potentially irreversable than Arctic sea ice loss." It also said.

 Evidence is emerging for rapid, interacting and sometimes self-perpetuating changes in the Antarctic environment. "

According to Reuters, the study gathered data from observations, ice cores, and ship logbooks to charge long-term changes in the area of sea ice, putting into context a rapid decline in recent years. 

That decline means a smaller ice sheet at the bottom of the world. Ice reflects the sun's heat back, to space, So less ice in and around Antarctica means more warmth is sucked in by the planet, making climate change that much worse. 

Reduced Antarctic ice  can shift ocean currents, which changes the distribution of krill, phytoplankton and other sources of nutrition for larger animals in the region, like emperor penguins. 

The amount of Antarctic ice remained pretty stable for at least the century ending around 2000, making life relatively predictable for the region's ecosystem.

Then. as the new century began,  the level of Antarctic ice began to increase, contrary to what you'd expect from climate change. Scientists suspect increased snowfall due to a warming world's ability to produce excess precipitation, in this case, snow, was partly responsible.

After that, suddenly, around a decade ago, the amount of Antarctic ice began to plummet rapidly. The amount of ice is now well below where it was during most of the 20th century. The decline so far shows no real sign of stopping or slowing down. 

The loss of coral reefs and the Antarctic ice situation are two examples of how one effect of climate change can have a snowball effect, making other aspects of a warming world worse, and also accelerate the rate of warming. 

 , opens new tab 

Arctic Sea Ice Melting Slows Despite Hotter Atmosphere

Dire warnings that Arctic sea ice would be a thing of
the past by several years ago hasn't happened. A 
new study explains why those warnings were
false alarms - but only for now. 

This sounds like great news:

Despite the increasing pressure of climate change, Arctic sea ice decline has slowed quite a bit. 

The slowdown has been noticeable in all months of the year.  The month of September has seen no statistically significant decline in sea ice over the past two decades. 

The melt rate per the past 20 years has been at least twice as slow as the longer term rate. 

But when it comes to climate change, there's never good news.  This slower melt won't last forever. More on that in a bit. 

Arctic sea ice is important because what goes on at the North Pole doesn't stay at the North Pole. If the ice went away entirely during summers,   the pace of Earth's warming could increase. White ice reflects away the sun's heat. Blue ocean water absorbs it. 

The Arctic is already warming faster than the rest of the planet and if the ice goes, the heating up there would really ramp up. 

An ice-free Arctic would accelerate climate change and throw things even more off balance than they already are. That, in turn could lead to even bigger climate extremes than we're seeing now.

Even if all that climate bad stuff doesn't happen, an ice-free Arctic would invite even more ships, resource mining,  geopolitical conflict, population and everything else that would dangerously pollute what has been a rather pristine environment.

THE STUDY

This slow Arctic melt all comes from research recently published in Geophysical Research Letters. 

Per the study's abstract:

"Most of the evidence from these climate models suggests that natural climate variations have played a large part in slowing the human-driven loss of sea ice. However, it is not entirely certain whether changes in the human influence on climate (the "forced response") have also contributed.

Overall, while it may sound surprising that Arctic sea ice loss has slowed down even as global temperatures hit record highs, the climate modeling evidence suggests we should expect periods like this to occur somewhat frequently."

The researchers ran climate models which show natural cycles can create these pauses in Arctic melting.

"Even though there is increased emissions (and) increased global temperatures, you can still get periods where you have very minimal loss of Arctic sea ice for sustained periods," said Mark England, lead author of the study. 

Energy always transfers back and forth between oceans and the atmosphere, with the oceans able to store much more energy than the air. 

There's natural cycles in which the oceans take in a little more energy than normal, which makes the atmosphere a tad cooler. Those cycles also sometimes allow the atmosphere to keep a slightly greater share of energy, so the climate warms up. 

The study concluded that natural cycles kept waters around the Arctic a little cooler, so the rate of ice loss has slowed. 

Mark England,  lead author of the study, said that without climate change, sea ice might well have expanded during the cycle we're in now.  

The study helps explain why dire predictions of an imminent summer time ice-free Arctic never came to pass. 

Sea ice in the Arctic hit record minimums in 2007 and 2012, leading to speculation the Arctic could have its first ice-free summer by 2020.  In hindsight, the researchers wrote, that idea was overly alarmist. 

MELT TO RESUME?

All good things must come to an end, though, and so will this cycle that's been preserving the Arctic sea ice. 

The current melting slowdown could last another five to 10 years, according to the climate models and the study. When that happens (It's a when, not an if) the ice loss would accelerate and at that point we might actually see the demise of Arctic sea ice during summers. 

In the short term, the ice up there is clearly in short supply up in the Arctic, despite the slowdown in melting. 

In its recent July climate report, the National Centers for Environmental Information said Arctic sea ice was the fourth smallest on record for July, at 420,000 square miles below average.  

Another melt zone scientist watch closely is Greenland. That ice will never entirely go away, at least not for hundreds, more likely thousands of years, if ever

Greenland matters even more than the Arctic because whatever melts off of Greenland becomes sea level rise.   If the ice on the Arctic ocean melts, it doesn't really raise se levels. It's like the ice in your gin and tonic melting. 

Greenland is probably subject to cyclical weather and climate patterns too, but the research we're talking about in this post didn't address that. 

This year, the Greenland melt has been above normal once again, but it's not setting records. There was a lot of melting between July 7 and 20, which tipped the scales to above the 1981 -2019 average for total melt extent, say the National Snow and Ice Data Center. But overall, the number of days with melting lagged behind some of the warmer summers in the recent past. 

There has been a last minute spike in Greenland ice melting in the past few days, but once that tapers off, that'll be mostly it for 2025.   By early September, the Greenland melt season is pretty much over.  

Tornado And Flood Nightmare Continues In Mid-U.S. Here in Vermont, A Little More Sneaky Ice?

Tornado debris is scattered far and wide after a deadly
tornado swept through Selmer, Tennessee 

It's going to be another very, very rough day in the middle of the nation with more tornadoes and a rapidly worsening flood situation. 

Meanwhile, up here in Vermont, despite nice hints of warmth here and there, we can't seem to shake the threat of ice raining on our springtime parade. 

I'll get into both, but as usual, first the grim national news:

TORNADOES INCREASE, AS DO FLOODS

So far, at least 44 tornadoes have been reported in the latest outbreak.  The count will rise as storm damage is assessed and as more twisters inevitably touch down today and probably tomorrow, too.

The death toll so far from the storms is at least seven, but that will unfortunately rise as debris is searched and more violent weather strikes. 

While today's awful weather will affect a wide area of the Midwest and South, Arkansas is today's particular victim. That state has the greatest chance of seeing potentially strong tornadoes and it faces the worst of today's flooding.  

That said, a huge area faces a big risk of flash flooding today from roughly Dallas all the way to Indianapolis. 

The rain is falling on already soaked ground. In the 48 hours ending at midnight last night, Memphis had received 6.9 inches of rain already, more than an inch more than what they normally see in the entire month of April. 

After tornado sirens kept blaring through the early morning hours, Nashville was deluged with just under four inches of rain Thursday, flooding much of the city. 

Most of Kentucky was under a flash flood warning this morning after as much as six inches of rain blasted down, and it was still pouring. This same area had one of its worse floods on record less than two months ago. 

The same general areas as today are under the gun with more tornadoes and especially flooding on Saturday. The weather system responsible for all this will finally start to head east Sunday, ending this long bout of punishing storms.

VERMONT EFFECTS

It really felt and looked like spring was arriving in this 
view of my St. Albans, Vermont yard Thursday evening....

Thursday morning's thunderstorm and rain and wind drama tapered off nicely by afternoon. Burlington ended up with 0.81 inches of rain, making it just barely the wettest April 3 on record. 

Not everybody warmed up as much as thought, as the Northeast Kingdom stayed cool all days. At 4 p.m. Thursday it was just 41 in Lyndonville, but 70 in Bennington. 

 Everything west of the Green Mountains did warm up nicely. Burlington got up to 68 degrees. 

It won't get quite that warm again for a little while yet, as a colder, unsettled pattern settles in for at least a few days. 

And guess what? After last weekend's ice storm, and the icy weather early Thursday in eastern Vermont, this weekend we might be in for.....you guessed it, more ice!

I don't think it will be widespread, but there might well be at least some areas with bad roads and maybe even some isolated power outages again. 

Here's the set up:

We're still expecting that stalled front causing the disaster in the middle of the nation to develop sort of a northeast extension that would allow weak waves of low pressure to come through us here in northern New England. 

For most of us, it still looks like that just means a rainy weekend.  But there's a couple of wrinkles.

....but the National Weather Service is still releasing
ice accumulation maps. This is for Saturday affecting
a few locations in eastern Vermont and in the much
of the Green Mountain high elevations. 

When the rain starts Saturday morning, it might be cold enough at first for a little snow and sleet at elevations of above 1,500.  I don't think we'll see much accumulation, but winter ain't over. 

That's not the end of it.  It looks like winds will help bring in a cold layer near the surface to areas along and east of the Green Mountains. 

That could make it cold enough for freezing rain once again. Mostly at higher elevations. But Saturday might, the cold air might creep down into valley floors east of the Greens, too.   

That could mean freezing rain.  

Not everybody will see freezing rain. In fact we don't know yet how extensive this might be. Meteorologists at the National Weather Service in South Burlington are taking a hard look at this and will update as they get more data.

There's a chance we'll see another winter weather advisory east of the Greens if this develops. 

People west of the Green Mountains should be safe from the ice. However, the northern Champlain Valley on Saturday afternoon looks like it will see another round of gusty winds, possibly gusting to at least 40 mph. 

That will just make a raw Saturday feel worse. 

Winter isn't done with us even after the weekend. A pretty strong disturbance and blast of cold air is due Tuesday.  Luckily the disturbance won't have a lot of moisture to work with, but it definitely looks like we might see at least some snow on Tuesday. Stay tuned for that. 

On the bright side, things aren't as bad as they were exactly a year ago. On this date, April 4, 2024, we had about foot of heavy, wet snow. 

Very Scary Storm Day Underway For Large Parts Of Nation, Here In Vermont, Some Trouble Too

A severe weather outbreak with the risk of strong 
tornadoes is in the cards today. The area in pink and
dark red is the riskiest area. The same areas under
the tornado danger will also face severe flooding
this week. 

Today and the next few days will be among the most dangerous and potentially deadly weather days the United States has had all year.  

Up here in Vermont, things aren't nearly that dire, but we will have our own share of weather trouble. 

I'll start things off with how bad the national weather situation is, then get into what we will deal with in the Green Mountain State. 

Spoiler: Us Vermonters should consider ourselves damn lucky compared to many other areas of the U.S.

NATIONAL DANGER

When I opened the National Weather Service home page this  morning, the U.S. map already looked scary.

A tornado watch was already in effect in parts of Oklahoma, Missouri, Kansas and Arkansas, with a tornado warning or two thrown in. Flood watches covered a large area of the Midwest and South.

Winter storm warnings and winter weather advisories stretched from  North Dakota, through the northern Great Lakes to northern New York and northern New England. 

This was just the beginning. Things will get a lot worse today. And stay really bad the rest of the week.

Tornadoes

NOAA's Storm Prediction Center had declared a relatively rare high risk severe weather and tornado danger zone in the area where Arkansas, Missouri, Tennessee, Kentucky and Illinois come together.  This is an area with Memphis pretty much at the center A large substantial risk zones surrounded that area 

"Numerous tornadoes, along with multiple long-track EF3 plus tornadoes appear likely," the Storm Prediction Center wrote this morning. 

It's so bad that if I lived in a mobile home or other unsubstantial structure, I'd leave now before there are any watches or warnings. People in this area better be ready to get to their tornado shelters pretty damn quickly this afternoon and evening 

The very same region most at risk for destructive tornadoes today is also the epicenter of a terribly high risk of catastrophic deadly flooding over the next few day.

Extreme Floods 

Weather fronts associated with today's tornadoes will stall near the region until at least Saturday. Daily rainfall in a broad area centered near Memphis will range from three to six inches and possibly more in some spots. 

By tomorrow, another rare high risk zone has been declared in Memphis and the surrounding adjacent states: This is a high risk zone for flooding, issued by NOAA's Weather Prediction Center. This means that terrible damage is pretty much inevitable. Even places that have never flooded before are at risk for inundation. 

The National Weather Service office in Memphis is already calling this a "historical rainfall event."

I brought up this flood risk in a post yesterday. If anything, expected rainfall totals might even go a bit higher than the foot or more I mentioned in the previous post.  This will be an ongoing thing starting today and going into next week. 

Even after the rain stops by Sunday, rivers in the region will be building toward potential record crests.

If possible, people who live in low lying areas in broad zone from roughly near Little Rock, Arkansas to Cincinnati, Ohio should be getting ready to leave, and if possible, moving possessions out. 

This whole thing will probably be yet another weather disaster costing $1 billion or more. 

VERMONT EFFECTS

The National Weather Service ice forecast map shows
widespread ice in central and eastern Vermont. It
won't be enough to cause widespread power outages
but will cause some icy road conditions. 

Unlike all those other areas, Vermont is not headed toward a full-fledged disaster,  But there are several things that will keep us on our toes the next few days.

We've got snow, sleet, freezing rain, rain, high winds, quick temperature changes and even thunder to contend with.  

The winter weather advisory that was in effect for just the Northeast Kingdom has now been expanded to include all of Vermont except the Champlain Valley and the western half of Rutland County. 

It'll cloud up pretty quickly today. Though temperatures will get well above freezing today, they'll crash temporarily with the onset of precipitation toward dark. So, we'll get a burst of snow this evening and tonight. 

Even in those areas with no winter weather advisory, that burst of snow and sleet overnight will make the roads quickly get slush and snow covered and slippery overnight. 

The Champlain Valley in particular is in for a noisy overnight and early morning. The snow should go over to rain after leaving maybe a dusting to 1.5 inches of snow. But the winds will really pick up.

A wind advisory has been posted for overnight in much of the Champlain Valley as gusts could go as high as 55 mph in hours before dawn. That could be enough for a few branches to come down, and maybe a couple power lines, too.  

During all that wind, the rain could come down pretty heavily at times and some rumbles of thunder could mix in with all this. 

Meanwhile, in eastern Vermont, the warmer air will have a harder time moving in.  The initial burst of snow will give way to another batch of freezing rain overnight and early Thursday. Between the initial wet snow, the freezing rain and some winds, there might be isolated power outages there, too, but nothing widespread. 

The main threat through the early part of the Thursday morning commute will be icy roads. 

The rain should taper off in the morning as temperatures rocket upward into the 50s east, 60s west during the day. The afternoon shouldn't actually be all that bad. 

Except: That wind advisory in especially the northern Champlain Valley will still be in effect. We expect another burst of winds, this time from the west, in the late afternoon and evening. That could cause a slight smattering of new power outages and a few more downed tree branches.

NEXT STORM

Friday looks nice, then the weekend, not so much. We'll get the tail end of that horrible flood I mentioned that's going to take place in the mid-South this weekend. 

No flooding for us, but the remnants of that system will swing several waves of low pressure our way. That'll be enough to set off some occasional rain all weekend. 

There could be a little snow and sleet at the onset of the new precipitation on Saturday, but this should be mostly rain.  It doesn't look like it will rain hard enough to set off any flooding worries. 

Beyond Sunday, the weather will turn colder.   Hard to say if there will be much precipitation in that colder air, but we'll at least see some snow showers, or cold rain showers.  There's a slight chance a stronger storm or two could form along the coast to bring extra snow during next week, but so far, the risk of that happening looks pretty damn low, which is great news.