Vermont's Remarkably Calm Weather Autumn Ended This Morning Amid Damaging Windstorm

UPDATE: WINDSTORM DAMAGE

Strong winds early this morning collapsed tents and scattered
art and craft booths at the Stowe Foliage Arts Festival,
forcing its cancelation for the rest of the weekend. 

Our early morning Vermont wind storm caused even more trouble than I reported earlier this morning.

Most notably, the wind caused extensive damage at - and force the closure - of the popular Stowe Foliage Arts Festival. 

Strong winds around 6 this morning swept and collared a large tent onto display booths, which were themselves toppled and in some cases blown around.  

The festival is working to refund ticket holders and to salvage as much artwork as they can.

As terrible as this situation is, it's fortunate the wind came through when nobody was in the tents. Had it come through later, the tents would have collapsed on dozens, perhaps even a few hundred people.

There's no estimate yet on the dollar amount of damage. The Arts Festival is normally a huge draw, and this weekend is likely the peak weekend both for Vermont fall foliage and for the annual influx of leaf peepers.

Traffic is reportedly backed up on Route 100 between Waterbury and Stowe, and on Interstate 89 in Waterbury. The traffic appears to be caused by the influx of tourist and not from wind damage. 

The number of power outages in Vermont peaked at more than 12,000 at around 8:30 this morning. That number had declined to about 4,700 as of 1 p.m. today. 

Reported wind gusts were reported as high as 58 mph at Lowell and Brookfield, Vermont and 52 mph at the National Weather Service office in South Burlington. 

The winds were caused by a rather dry, but strong cold front that passed through Vermont this morning. There were some strong winds aloft that the front dragged down toward the surface, which created the hefty wind gusts. 

It was still quite breezy out there as of early afternoon, but the winds have diminished below the point where they could cause more damage. 

PREVIOUS DISCUSSION

While cataclysmic disasters, record shattering heat waves, wildfires and other calamities swirled through the United States this autumn, we in Vermont were blissful bystanders. 

Vermont has sailed along peacefully with remarkably benign weather since late August.

 Sure, it's been mostly much warmer than average, but we haven't had extreme heat, but we have had an incredible amount of sun. 

There's been no floods,  no severe thunderstorms, the wind has consisted of just pleasant breezes, and for most of us, the first frosts and freezes of the season have been running late.  Even spells of high humidity have been absent. 

We needed the break, after the rough summer of floods we had.

Well, this long break is over. 

The great news is there is no new disaster looming over Vermont that I can see. But the placid weather is over, at least for now, and things are getting active. And we're back to the wait a minute it will change type weather. 

Expect. wind, frost, rain and cold temperatures. And snow. Don't forget snow. 

It started early this morning.

GUSTY WINDS

I feel like an idiot. We have some cold-sensitive potted trees out in the back deck, including a sort of tall palm type tree, a hibiscus and an orange tree.  I was going to take them in Friday evening, but I had a rough day, so I blew it off. 

This large umbrella, which was anchored to our deck floor
in St. Albans, Vermont, was toppled by strong winds this
morning and narrowly missed shattering a large window
on our house. The strong winds cost power to more 
than 10,000 Vermont customer early today. 

The plan was to take them in tonight, given forecasts of a possible Saturday night frost. More on that in a moment. 

Problem was, I didn't pay attention to the forecast. After a balmy night, a strong cold front passed through around 5 a.m up here in St. Albans. 

The forecast had called for some rather strong wind gusts with and just after the cold front and sure enough. They gusted to at least 50 mph at my place before dawn today. 

The wind knocked down two of those trees. Both look somewhat damaged. I'm a moron. I think I can save them, though. Gusts have so far reached 45 mph in Burlington and 49 mph in Montpelier. I'm sure a few spots have gusted to maybe 55 mph. The wind over-performed somewhat

Those winds have been causing some scattered issues out there. Some tree limbs and a few power lines are coming down here and there. As of 6:45 a.m today, vtoutages.org reported 8,000 homes and businesses mostly in central and northern Vermont without power. That number was rising rapidly, and reached 10,000 by 7:15 a.m.

The gusty winds should continue for a few hours this morning before diminishing somewhat that afternoon.

Today's near-normal high temperatures in the low 60s happened early this morning. They'll be falling all day. In anticipation of a chilly night

FROST SUNDAY MORNING?

Depending on how fast clouds come in tonight, we might have the most widespread frost of the season so far overnight. That's not saying much, given we haven't had any really cold weather to speak of so far.

The cold front will slow down south of us to hook up with a developing storm (which I'm getting to). Clouds should start streaming back north overnight, which could put a halt to the frost threat in southern and central Vermont. The best chances of a frost are in the northern half of Vermont away from Lake Champlain. If you still have some tender plants out there are garden veggies that need harvesting, do it today. 

COLD STORM

Most of the rain we have managed to receive since late August has come amid mild weather storms. This one will be more akin to a winter storm. But don't worry, unless you live way up in the higher elevation, there's no need to dig out your snow shovels just yet.

But this will be a damp, cold drenching nonetheless. Rain will start to break out Sunday afternoon. Highs should probably make it to near 50 and that's about it. 

Rain should continue Sunday night and into Monday. Lows Sunday night could get into the upper 30s - perilously close to snow temperatures. But some lame amounts of warmish air coming in aloft should keep snow and sleet limited to the highest elevations. At least that's how it looks now.

Amid the light rain and clouds Monday, it will be November like, with highs only in the 40s.

The rainfall won't cause any flooding, but it might be something of a soaker. Predicted rainfall with this in Vermont is somewhere a little either side of one inch. 

MORE HIGH ELEVATION SNOW?

The November weather should continue Tuesday and Wednesday. That storm system we're getting will stall briefly in eastern Canada, sending chilly, gusty winds and moisture through Vermont. That means more rain and snow showers.

Some flakes could well make it onto valley floors at times during this period, but shouldn't accumulate. Such flurries are not weird for mid-October, but they'll be a shock to the system if they do happen.

Very high Green Mountain elevations  - above 2,500 feet -  could see several inches of snow out of this if the moisture in the cold northwest winds is adequate. Ski areas will love this, not because they'll open right away, but because the snow might spur season ticket sales.

TEMPORARY?

There are signs that this spell of active well is just a pre-winter tease. I'm still seeing signs we'll go back to generally benign, calm and often sunny weather starting Thursday and Friday. A noticeable warming trend should set in by Friday as well and continue at least into next weekend.  

Tuesday Evening Vermont Storm Update: Batten Down The Hatches!

Updated National Weather Service/South Burlington 
wind gust forecast for overnight. Click on image to
make it bigger/easier to see. If anything, the forecast
has shifted to include higher wind gusts in 
the Champlain Valley, compared to earlier forecasts.

 As of  5 p.m. Tuesday, snow has moved into Vermont a little earlier than forecast. 

That will make some roads dicey earlier than we thought they would, so the evening commute is turning out to be not great.  

The snow will be light to at times moderate, but won't amount to a huge amount before, say 7 p.m. We could see a couple inches by then. 

The evening snow is the opening act to the main show which will hit hard later tonight.  We've already seen wind gusts of 70 mph in western New York cities like Buffalo. That high speed air is heading right in our direction. 

The forecast hasn't changed much since this morning. We're in for an awful overnight here in Vermont, with strong winds, bursts of heavy wet snow, downed trees, power lines and blocked roads.

As of late this afternoon, you should have gotten all your outdoor errands done and huddling in your houses for the night. Here in St. Albans this evening, my husband is making a hearty stew to get us through the early evening . We've stored drinking water in jugs. LED candles and head lamps are at the ready. My cell phone is plugged in, hungrily accepting a nice battery charge. 

I don't know whether the power will be out at our house later tonight or for how long. But since widespread power outages are pretty much a sure bet in Vermont, everybody should be prepared. 

THE SCENARIO

Winds have started to increase as of 5 p.m., ,but are still reasonable, with gusts mostly at or under 30 mph. They'll gradually increase over the next few hours.

Heavier precipitation - the kind that will move in soon - more often than not suppresses high winds in Vermont, so the worst of the gusts won't happen  - at least for most of us - until after 10 p.m., when we should have somewhat of a lull in the precipitation.

We're still expecting a heavy thump of wet snow for the first half of the night, and that will prime trees, branches and power lines to fail once the wind really picks up. 

Since a lot of the precipitation will be snow, with only some rain late tonight and tomorrow, I'm even less worried about flooding than I was this morning. 

But of course we really have our hands full with the wind. 

A bit of drier air will move in aloft after midnight to suppress the snow and rain somewhat. At the same time, what is known as a low-level jet will move overhead. A low level jet is a band of high speed winds just a few to several thousand feet overhead.  

Screen grab of a video I took in January, 2016 of a 
downslope windstorm near Cambridge, Vermont 
that had broken trees looming over a road. 
Similar scenes should happen overnight and 
tomorrow morning. 

Meteorology is basically fluid dynamics physics. Air flow acts a LOT like water flow. The Green Mountains act as sort of a submerged boulder in a fast-flowing river in a storm situation like this.

 The strong east winds in the low level jet are forced to rise a bit to accommodate that "submerged boulder" consisting of the Green Mountains.  

It's basically the wave you see above the submerged boulder in the river, and the subsequent waves downstream. 

When the wave reaches its peak over the "boulder" the high speed wind is sort of grabbed and shoved down the western slopes of the Greens. The air gains momentum on its downslope path, which makes the wind even stronger.

 So, we're still expecting winds gusts late tonight in the 50 to 65 mph range. Local gusts very near the western slopes in particularly wind-prone areas could reach or go over 75 mph. 

One interesting - and rather ominous - subtle difference in the National Weather Service forecast since this morning, is the expected highest wind gusts have been nudged a little bit more away from the western slopes and closer to the Champlain Valley and Route 7 corridor in southwestern Vermont. 

It looks like top gusts of 60 to 70 mph could occur along and just east of Route 7. That's a pretty populated area. That makes us prone to more power outages and even some structural damage to buildings overnight. 

Much of the Northeast Kingdom also looks like they are in for quite a blow. 

We're still on track for lots of power outages. The majority  - but not all of us - should be fine though about 11 p.m. or so. Then it hits.

Mercifully, the period of highest winds looks like it will only last roughly six hours - from about midnight to 6 a.m. Then they'll diminish quite a lot. Wednesday will still be gusty, but not ridiculous. 

Actually, Wednesday in most of Vermont is shaping up to be a not terrible day, at least compared to the tempest we'll endure tonight.

Sure, it'll be breezy to windy, and we'll have a risk of showers through much of the day. But temperatures should peak in the low 40s, and only gradually cool down during the late afternoon and evening. 

This storm is being compared to that awful storm in December, 2022. But one big difference is that one featured a flash freeze and moderate snowstorm at the tail end.  That's not happening with this one.

I'm always looking for a bright side, folks! 

I won't get into it tonight, but we're still looking at another storm Saturday that will be similar to tonight's. So far, that Saturday storm is looking slightly weaker than tonight's but it will still cause additional problems. 

I'll get into that storm after we deal with tonight's mess. 

Video

To give you a taste of what to expect late tonight and early tomorrow morning, here's video I shot of a downslope wind event near Cambridge, Vermont in January, 2016. If anything, tonight's windstorm could be worse than this.

Click on this link to view, or if you see image below, click on that to view.