Quiet Vermont Weather Week During What Is Usually Quietest Weather Month Of Year. On Bright Side, No Hurricanes, As In Past Septembers

Damage in Brattleboro, Vermont after the Great 
New England Hurricane of 1938. This year is an
incredibly quiet Atlantic hurricane season, thanks to
El Nino. However, in the past, Septembers have
brought destructive tropical storms to Vermont.

The weather in and around Vermont is quiet, and will mostly remain on the quiet side for the next week. It's a nice contrast to the record heat and destructive storms elsewhere in United States lately.  

This is the time of year when large high pressure systems drift into New England from southern Canada. It's true this year, even with a stuck weather pattern that has kept the south central U.S. broiling since July, and has kept the severe weather in the Great Lakes/Mid-Atlantic states for the past several weeks.

It seems like the almost the only extreme weather Vermont sees in September is dying hurricanes, which can cause severe flooding and a lot of wind damage.

Not this year, of course. Incredibly, the National Hurricane Center sees no signs of tropical storms forming in the Atlantic Ocean for the next seven days. That's an absolutely wild thing to say at the peak of hurricane season.  El Nino is really doing its job at suppressing Atlantic hurricanes. 

In the past, of course, hurricanes and tropical storms have really tormented Vermont in past Septembers.

Great New England Hurricane

The biggest one, of course, was the Great New England Hurricane in 1938, killing nearly 700 people After coming ashore on Long Island and Connecticut, the 1938 hurricane quickly reached Brattleboro then curved northwestward toward Burlington. 

Especially along and east of that track, winds leveled forest across Vermont. Here's one example from the Vermont Weather Book: The hurricane destroyed 2,400 of 3,500 trees in a sugarbush in Cabot. And as we all know, it takes a long time to grow new trees, so this storm was incredibly devastating. 

The western side of a hurricane is especially rainy. We had a lot of rain in the days leading up to the hurricane, so the torrential rains  from the storm caused extensive flooding, some of the worst on record in Vermont. 

It was a rough stretch for floods in Vermont. Our worst flood on record hit in 1927, as most Vermonters know. A terrible destructive flood hit in 1936, then we had the great hurricane of 1938. Three mega-floods within 11 years.

We've had more recent tropical storms, of course. I"m omitting storms like Tropical Storm Irene in 2011, because that one hit in August. I'm only discussing September storms here.

David/Frederick, 1979

In 1979, two ex-tropical storms pestered Vermont in September. Ex-Hurricane David, having killed 2,000 in the Caribbean, swept up the East Coast from Florida to New England. The center of the now-former hurricane crossed Vermont on roughly a Danby to Thetford path. 

The storm brought heavy rain, damaging winds and a possible tornado that took part of the roof off a new supermarket in West Rutland 

A week later, ex-hurricane Frederick, which had devastated parts of the Gulf Coast, crossed northwest Vermont with more wind and rain statewide. A possible a collapsed a covered bridge between South Newbury, Vermont and Haverhill, New Hampshire. 

Floyd, 1999

We were damn lucky Vermont was having a serious drought in the weeks leading up to ex-hurricane Floyd in 1999. It slammed into North Carolina and at the time became the most expensive hurricane in that state's history. 

The weakening hurricane continued on up the East Coast, coming across Vermont on September 16-17. Three to seven inches of rain fell, with locally higher amounts. This would have caused severe flooding, except that severe drought meant water levels were extremely low before the storm. .

Still, flooding hit. The Tunbridge World's Fair had to be canceled due to high water A section of Route 5 in Weathersfield was washed away, One person died when high winds blew a tree down on them 

Next Few Days

We're definitely not going to have a tropical storm in the next few days. All in all, it will be a nice Labor Day weekend 

Today: Partly cloudy, a chance of widely scattered light showers Highs in the 70s

Sunday/Monday: Sunshine, with daytime highs in the 70s. The only major clouds would be patchy dense fog in the river valleys both mornings. That'll burn off by mid-morning 

The next chance of rain will come along probably on Wednesday and Thursday. So far, rainfall amounts with this thing don't' look like they'll be that impressive.  

Wild Weather Coming To Much Of Nation, But Boring Weather Here In Vermont. Boring Is A Good Thing

Lightning set a grove of palm trees ablaze yesterday
outside of San Diego,  California. It was part of an
opening salvo of volatile weather expected across
much of the U.S. in coming days. Here in
Vermont, the weather will stay blissfully boring

 On Tuesday, two tornadoes appeared in of all places near Fresno, California. 

It was part of some storminess that socked California with bursts of heavy rain, thunderstorms and wind. Lightning strikes set a grove of palm trees on fire not far from San Diego, burning about 100 of the trees in a spectacular if very bizarre fire.  

A tornado and strong thunderstorms in California make me nervous. Especially during severe weather and tornado season. 

Forecasters are already calling for a tornado and storm outbreak in the coming days in  the Plains states. The Fresno tornado makes it seem all the more likely. 

It's all part of a weather pattern that's pretty common this time of year. Strong southwest winds bring dry air into the western Plains and eastern slopes of the Rocky Mountains. Humid southeast winds come into the southern Plains and Midwest from the Gulf of Mexico.  Cool air comes in from the northern Plains. That sets up the volatile weather situation. 

Meanwhile this weather pattern brings a relatively gentle northwest flow of air to New England. The result is relatively cool, and definitely boring weather. More details on Vermont's weather further down in this post, but first, the set-up:

ROUGH WEATHER

The rough weather will begin today with a widespread fire hazard across a huge area of the eastern Rockies and western Plains as those dry southwest winds blow in from the Desert Southwest. The main area of worry today is in northern New Mexico, northwest Texas, eastern Colorado, eastern Wyoming and parts of South Dakota. 

The Southeastern United States has also endured wildfires amidst their drought and that will continue today.   

In terms of severe weather, we've already had at least one rough episode this month. At least 110 tornadoes were reported in the Midwest on April 17,  

The expected severe weather begins modestly today with a few severe storms possible in a narrow corridor in the Central Plains, 

Tomorrow, severe thunderstorms, a few with gorilla hail and a few tornadoes are forecast in the central Plains. Gorilla hail, for the uninitiated, does not involve primates, unless a human is hit with one of those scary hailstones.  Gorilla hail  are really, really, really big hailstones.  On Friday, severe thunderstorms will focus on Arkansas.

Forecasters are especially worried about areas around Oklahoma and Kansas. It's not possible to be sure this far in advance, but there could be a very nasty tornado outbreak over the weekend. Especially on Sunday. Stay tuned.

VERMONT FORECAST

All that rough weather in the Plains is not going to bother us here.  This type of weather pattern either shears apart and destroys those storm systems as they try to approach us. Or they shunt them down to our south.  

So our weather gets boring. In this case, boring is very good. No drama like we've had in recent days. No tornadoes. No hail. No snow. No hard freezes. No heavy rain. Just cool, quiet spring weather 

It'll be cool today through Friday, with highs within a few degrees of 50 today and in the low 50s tomorrow and Friday. We should be in the upper 50s this time of year. So, a bit chilly, but nothing unreasonable like we had earlier this week. 

The only thing we really have to worry about in the next few days is brush fires. It still hasn't really greened up out there. All that dried up grass and weeds and last autumn's' leaves dry up fast this time of year. Relatively stiff breezes, especially tomorrow, raise the risk of brush fires.  Now is not the time to play with matches. Well, it's never a good time to play with matches, but especially now.

The first in a series of storms from the Plains will wash out on approach to us this weekend. There's a slight chance some light showers will hang in there and give us some brief dampness Saturday or Sunday, but don't count on it. 

It'll turn slightly warmer, too with highs within a few degrees either side of 60 Saturday and Sunday. 

The next chance of rain still looks to be on April 29. But even then, that storm looks like it might be weakening as it approaches us, so we might not get much out for that one either. 

 

Quiet Weather Now Will Change To Wintry Risks

Very few colors and splotches on the National Weather 
Service national map this morning. That means there's 
lots of quiet, unthreatening weather around. This being
November, that will surely change soon.

The whole nation yesterday and today has been remarkably quiet for November.  

The National Weather Service home page has a color coded map of the United States that shows all the weather warnings, watches and advisories everywhere. 

A colorful map is bad news. That means there's a lot of rough weather out there. A largely blank map means clear sailing. 

This morning, this map is decidedly bland. 

 A small section of Washington State was under a freezing fog advisory. There were alerts for minor coastal flooding and rip currents along Florida's east coast.

And there were a smattering of dense fog advisories here and there. That's it. Nothing major at all. Pretty remarkable for November. 

This being November, though, this quiet map will change fairly quickly.  Storms and wind and other hazards will bring more weather alerts and advisories in the coming days to make the national map a little more "colorful." We here in Vermont will be affected, too.

Don't worry. There's nothing extreme in the offing. But this being late November, you're going to have to get used to the fact that most storm systems - small and large - will carry the risk of wintry weather here in the Green Mountain State. 

This starts Sunday evening. A relatively small storm zipping by will produce some mixed precipitation pretty much over much of the state. In the Champlain Valley, it looks like any snow or sleet will change quickly to a cold rain, so there won't be much accumulation.  

There will probably be a dusting to up to three inches of accumulation, though, in the mountains and in northeastern Vermont. 

It also looks like some snow or mixed precipitation might swing through Wednesday night.  Again, this will fall SO far short of storm of the century.  It'll be more like storm of the day. 

This, though, is all a reminder that, yes, we've had a gentle late autumn and approach to winter so far.  It doesn't look like it's going to get super wintry in the near future.  

Long range forecasts call for warmer than normal temperatures on most days into early December. Even so, benign weather this time of year in Vermont will inevitably involve snow or mixed precipitation from time to time. 

Deal with it.