United States MAGA Meltdown Over Canadian Wildfire Smoke Is A National Embarrassment

Thick smoke in Chicago last week.
MAGA has been embarrassingly 
whining about the smoke without
offering any real help or 
solutions to the problem. 

Just stop already. 

MAGA is going nuts over the wildfire smoke billowing into theUnited States from Canada, and it has long since become embarrassing. 

Somehow, MAGA thinks Canada can wave a magic wand to stop the fires, or, they're sending the smoke over the border as some sort of deliberate provocation. 

Sigh.

MAGA has spent the past week falling over each attacking Canada for the fires, as if they aren't battling the blazes with everything they have and praying for soaking, widespread rains. 

We have so many, sad disgusting examples. Let's go through a bunch of them, just to wallow in the stupidity. : 

Republican Sen. Bernie Moreno, R-Ohio said he is introducing legislation that would require an investigation as to whether the Canadian smoke had harmed U.S. air quality and to sanctions those responsible. Moreno ought to be careful, given the harm the United States has caused Canada.

Moreno's legislation gets worse.

As Daily Beast reports, "The bill reportedly goes so far as to threaten to revoke the visas of those deemed responsible for the 'atrocity.' The legislation also 'expresses a sense' that the Canadian ambassador should be declared persona non grata until the smoke no longer affects the U.S." 

Moreno's legislation would ban U.S. government contracts with Canada and Export-Import Bank assistance and authorize the president to most import restrictions.  

Katie Miller, the wife of the odious White House aide Stephen Miller, posted the wild idea that annexing Canada would have spared the U.S. of the wildfire smoke. "This is why Canada should be the 51st state," she wrote. 

Rep. Lisa McClain, Michigan, had this temper tantrum on the social media platform X, formerly Twitter: "Michiganders shouldn't have to breathe negligence....."YEAR AFTER YEAR the smoke crossed the border while Canada does nothing. Stop exporting your smoke into our skies. Enough is enough!"

Does she expect Canada to erect a wall to block the smoke?

Also on X, Rep. Nick Langworthy, R-NY, whined, "This is no longer a one-time emergency - it's becoming an annual public health crisis. This is unacceptable."

It's not just MAGA Republicans. I found a Democrat who entered the fray. Michigan State Rep. Alabas Farhat  posted on Threads:

"For four straight years, Canada has failed to get these fires under control, and Michigan continues to pay the price." 

He referred the fires as "Canada forest management failures." He also said if Canada "refuses" to stop the fires (as if!) he said "There should be consequences."

This motive for all this whining? Almost all of it is in service to the Orange Lump of a president. We remember all the anti-Canada blather Trump has belched, the demands to make Canada the 51st state. And, after a couple days of all this, on Friday, all this stupidly and predictable whining culminated with Donald Trump saying he would add to the tariffs he's already imposed on Canada.

The Orange Lump said Canada "has refused to engage in basic Forest Management and Debris Removal."  I guess Canada was supposed to rake its forests, just as he insisted California should have done. 

Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney had a devastatingly low key reaction to the MAGA tantrums: "Climate change is everyone's responsibility, truly everyone's including the United States."

ABOUT THAT CLIMATE CHANGE

There have always been occasional years with Canadian or western United States fires that belch smoke into the United States. It used to be infrequent. 

On May 19, 1790 - way back when - was labeled the "Famous Dark Day" in New England, according to the Vermont Weather Book.  Candles were needed to read, and the air had an eerie, brassy hue. That was probably smoke from the western United States or maybe the northern Great Lakes region.

On September 6, 1881, it was the legendary, "Yellow Day,"  Everything took on a yellow hue, and artificial light was needed to read documents and books during the day. Basically the same thing happened in September, 1908, and September 1950.

So we used to have smoky days, but since those days were a rarity, they became legend. 

Now however, smoke attacks are no longer a rarity, but a regular occurrence. So what changed?

Canada has roughly 1.4 million square miles of forest. Most of it is boreal forest, a broad area representing 30 percent of the global forest area in northern areas of Canada, Russia and Alaska. 

Most of the forests are remote, and impossible to manage like forests in more populated areas in the continental United States.

Fires have gotten worse and widespread in recent years for reasons that mostly have to do with climate change. The snow in the spring melts sooner than it once did, leaving more time for the landscape two dry out than it once did Parts of Canada are warming at twice the rate of the global average, creating heat waves that further dry things out. 

The summer heat also destabilizes the air, creating thunderstorms with relatively little rain but plenty of lightning strikes that set off fires.  Invasive bark beetles kills swaths of foresters, leaving behind tinder dry dead trees. 

So, contrary to MAGA, Canada isn't trying to torture Americans by sending choking wildfire smoke into the United States. They are in large part a victim of climate change. And historically, the United States has always been the #1 or #2 greenhouse gas emitters in the world. 

In the end, climate change has us breathing smoke that makes us sick, and will end up killing some of us. 

MAGA has been yelling outrageous things about the wildfire smoke. But just hint to them climate change might have had something to do with it, the screaming just becomes that much louder. 

THE FIRES

On Saturday, 949 fires were burning across Canada, according to the Canadian Wildland Fire Information System.  The intense fires in Ontario were quieter, thanks to some rain.

But those weren't the only fires burning in North America.  As of Saturday, there were 73 large fires burning across the United States, including 17 new large incidents, according to the National Interagency Fire Center. Most of these were in the West and in northern Minnesota. There were also a multitude of smaller fires burning around the nation. 

Fires are also burning in the boreal forests of Siberia. In recent days, a fire in Norway spread from a townhouse and into a forest, where it continued on to destroy about 100 homes. It was the largest such fire in Norway's history. 

TRAGEDY, HELP AND HONOR

It's not as if Canada is just gleefully sending smoke to the U.S.  Smoke has choked much of southern Canada, including large cities like Toronto, Ottawa and Montreal. 

The Canadian fires have especially hit the First Nations communities in Ontario. Thousands were evacuated. An unknown number of houses have burned, but the number of destroyed buildings is easily in the hundreds. 

Normally, and in the past, the United States and Canada would help each other with emergencies. Canada is still doing that. 

Sometimes, firefighters give their lives to the effort. About a week ago, Nicholas Dale, 56 of Sooke, British Columbia died in a helicopter crash while responding to a wildfire in not too far north of Telluride. 

Dale's death make the vitriol aimed at Canada over the smoky atmosphere especially galling. 

In a demonstration of how much more decent most Americans are, compared to the noxious MAGA crowd, Wyoming Public Radio described this scene as the sad process of returning Dale's body to Canada began. :

"On Monday morning, a line of firetrucks, ambulances and other emergency response vehicles flashing their lights stretched for nearly a mile as the convoy passed through the little towns and small cities between Gunnison and Grand Junction. 

In Montrose, hundreds somberly lined U.S. Highway 509 holding American flags to honor Dale."

STUPIDITY WORSENS

Meanwhile, he whining from MAGA kept getting louder and even more bizarre gets even worse in some circles  

Right Wing Watch posted on X (formerly Twitter) posted this gem of a clip from MAGA activist Eric Metaxas: 

"Who's telling me how to live my life?  I'm an adult man in a free country, and you're telling me, 'limit your outdoor activity.'' he said, "How dare they say that. Who has the right to tell me or you or anyone anything? It's a free country. I can do whatever I want."

Never mind this was just an advisory, kind of like telling people to drive carefully in a winter storm. But the guy isn't very bright. The comments section was glorious

"He should definitely go outside ad jog for HOURS!

"Fine, Eric. Please go outside and put your mouth over a diesel bus exhaust. It will benefit all of us."

"Eric doesn't understand the difference between a suggestion and an order Poor guy."

"Oh the humanity! This dude is the victim of receiving information! Will the abusive alerts never stop enslaving him?"

"Getting asthma to own the libs."

"Dear Eric - I forbid you from running out in front of traffic on the expressway."

Metaxas is a great example of the low, ignorant, tragicomic  MAGA mentality. They can do anything! They are all powerful!  While the rest of us roll our eyes and laugh at them. 

MAGA seems to think the abuse they've hurled at Canada is a flex, showing how powerful they are. Trump and his minions are actually demonstrating exactly how weak they are. Their pathetic insults and whining is a precise demonstration of how impotent MAGA really is. 

We should all remember that despite their bluster, the rest of us hold most of the power. We ought to use it. 

  

Green Mountains Of Vermont To Often Fade Behind A Smoky Haze For The Rest Of Summer. A Climate Change Story

Smoke obscures the view along Lake Champlain 
last summer, July 26, 2025.

Vermont's first air quality alert of the summer went into effect this past Sunday. Thankfully, the bad air didn't turn out to be quite as bad as feared.  

The wildfire smoke that was approaching the state from southern Quebec dissipated more and sooner than expected, leaving us with relatively safe air, although it was kind of hazy. 

Get used to the haze. It's going to be with us much of the rest of the summer. And probably the first half of autumn. 

I'm sure we will see more air quality alerts before mountains snows in Canada and the West finally snuff out the fires. 

Huge wildfires are burning in the U.S. West. There's an enormous cluster of fires burning west of Hudson Bay, Canada. More fires are raging in northern Canada. All that smoke has to go somewhere. 

Often, that pollution will end up in the eastern United States, including here in Vermont.  That fact is always a bummer for me. 

During June, North American wildfires were not especially extensive. Which left us with plenty of days in which we could gaze out at the Green Mountains of Vermont and they were.....green.  Luscious, rich, elegant, gorgeous green as far as the eyes could see. All this under a deep, pure blue sky flecked with puffy white clouds. You know, the iconic view of a Vermont summer.  

Those days of clear air will now become much fewer and further between for the rest of the summer.  

Until recent years, wildfire smoke in Vermont hadn't been a thing. Back in the 1950s, 60s and 70s, we did had a lot of "Those Lazy, Hazy, Crazy Days of Summer," as Nat King Cole sang in a 1963 hit. Especially haze. That was mostly ickiness from auto exhaust and factory smokestacks to Vermont's south and west during mid-20th century heat waves. 

The Clean Air Act removed a lot of the haze. Not all of it, but it was an improvement. Then, in the past decade or so,  wildfires around the world, including in North American started getting worse. The hotter world dries out the forests earlier in the spring than they once did. Those forests keep getting more and more parched as sumner goes on.    

So, many of the forests went poof.   

Forest fires now burn more than twice as much tree cover as they did two decades ago, according to University of Maryland researchers. 

All those fires spew smoke, obviously. Per-person exposure to wildlife smoke in the United States was four times higher during 2020-24 on average each year, than during 2006-2019, according to Climate Central. 

The haze from these huge fires often ends up engulfing much if not all of the United States, including here in Vermont. 

Summertime air quality alerts in the Green Mountain State used to be a rarity.  But that's changed. Most recent summers have featured many hazy, acrid days. A few days in the summer nowadays are actually dangerously polluted. 

Even if the pollution isn't enough to prompt those alerts in our climate changed world, the smoke spoils the view.  The mountains, especially those in the distance, fade into a bluish, grayish murk. Some days, the smoke is high overhead, so the mountains still looks vivid and green. But the sky overhead is depressing. Instead of a deep blue, it's an almost colorless, weak =pale grey-blue. 

That looks like Vermont's future for the rest of the summer.  

That's not to say every day will feature haze. Air currents can still thread the needle between the wildfires and the smoky areas to deliver delightfully clear, refreshing air. Or, on some days, the smoke will be thin enough to be just an accent, giving the mountains just an added shade of blue mixed with the green. 

At least the sunrises and sunsets will be more spectacular as the smoke brings out the reds and oranges in the clouds. 

As I write this Wednesday morning, the sky overhead is blue enough, but the distant Adirondacks are barely visible through an off-blue haze the color of exhaust from a malfunctioning 1970s-era Buick.  

Climate change isn't only about heat waves and weird weather. It chips away at our health, our atmosphere, our way of life, our well being.  I just wish the Powers That Be would recognize that when they complain about a lousy view of the mountains during their Vermont summer vacations  

Vermont Goes Out Of The Heat (Sort Of) And Into The Smoke

It was already sort of hazy as of 10 a.m. as he "Hazecam" view
from\the University of Vermont shows. Note the it's 
hazier on the right side of the photo. That's to the north
and thicker haze and smoke is coming from that direction
for the rest of today. 

 The worst of the heat wave is waning in Vermont now after many places had three 90 degree days in a row. 

One thing I didn't take into consideration, though, when I squawked Friday morning about how much better the weather will be,was the annoying forest fie smoke that's blowing in,   

Here's what's happening: 

TODAY

As expected, a weak cold front is coming through today, from Quebec It's not an impressive front, not at all. No big whoosh of cool, refreshing air.

 Just a trend toward somewhat cooler air and eventually, by late today or tonight, it will no longer be air you can wear. More like run of the mill low-ish, pretty reasonable  humidity.   

We'll still have highs well into the 80s for most of Vermont today, maybe low 80s far north, near 90 warmest valleys south. As we start the day today, the dreaded dew point will start out nasty, in the upper 60s. But it will gradually decline, with that drier air spreading north to south. 

Isolated thunderstorms or showers could accompany this transition, but it won't be anything widespread or dramatic. Most of the showers and storms should be in southern Vermont. 

The problem is this sorta, kinda cooler air is grabbing some smoke and sending it our way.  Some of it's coming from Colorado and other western states. Another big chunk of smoke is coming from a nasty fire burning a little south of James Bay, Canada. 

So, what was supposed to be somewhat refreshing air will have us choking in smoke. It most likely won't be as bad as some of the worst smoke attacks we've had in recent years, but it will be bad enough. 

Nevertheless, an air quality alert is in effect for the northern half of Vermont now through midnight. The smoke starts to come in as soon as the first hint of somewhat less humid air begins to arrive, so it was starting to get hazy and smoky in northern parts of the state early this morning. 

Satellite photos shows the smoke isn't as thick as some past episodes, but it's staying closer to the ground than many other past smoke attacks. 

SUNDAY

The worst of the smoke should be gone, but it will probably remain rather hazy.  It'll still be a nice day, though there should be some extra afternoon clouds. It will also be somewhat less humid. It'll be very warm again, with highs in the 80s. So, unlike what I said yesterday, it won't be a stellar, perfect summer day like last Sunday. But it will still be plenty nice.

MONDAY-THURSDAY

A mostly dry, very warm period. That disturbance we thought would soak southern Vermont Monday looks like it might be going even further south. So at this point, it's looking like only far southern Vermont will get a little wet.

We'll have a slow increase in heat and humidity as we go from Monday to Thursday. It will never get as hot or steamy as it was over the past three days but hot enough. Highs each day will get well into the 80s with some low 90s appearing Wednesday and Thursday.

It's going to be  dry period, despite the kinda high humidity we'll see. There might be isolated showers or storms from time to time but don't bet on it. You'll need to water gardens and plants and things like that. 

Our next shot at substantial rain doesn't come along until next Friday. 

Wildfire Smoke From Canada In 2023 Significantly Worsened Vermont Childhood Asthma

Smoke shrouds Interstate 89 near Georgia, Vermont on
June 25, 2023 as wildfires raged in nearby Quebec.
Recent UVM research indicates the smoky summer
worsened asthma among Vermont children,

Asthma symptoms worsened among children in Vermont and northern New York in the summer of 2023 as clouds of wildfire smoke billowed into the region from huge Canadian blazes, new research confirms. 

We've always known that bad air quality can make asthma sufferers more miserable and put them in danger. But it's interesting and useful to learn to what extent wildfire smoke is a problem. 

Research on the effects of wildfire smoke in populations far from the actual blazes is rather scant as Vermont Public notes. Most science focuses on people near wildfires or those exposed to the smoke for long periods of time. 

The new research from the University of Vermont is useful for those of us occasionally breathing smoke from hundreds or even thousands of miles away. The UVM study is the first to consider the impacts of wildfire smoke on asthma patients in the Northeast. 

"This shows that even these small levels of changes in air quality due to wildfire smoke have the same impact of negatively impacting children's health," said Anna Maassel, the study's lead author and a doctoral student at UVM's Rubenstein School of Environment of Natural Resources. 

That's a big deal because roughly 7 percent of Vermont's children have asthma. 

Here's how this worked, as Vermont Public reports:

"Researchers studied electronic health records for more than 900 people, aged 3-21, being treated for asthma within the University of Vermont Health Network over three summers, from 2022 to 2024. They then compared this with estimated smoke exposure within zip codes, based on air quality data.

They found that children's asthma in Vermont and New York was markedly less well-controlled in 2023, when Quebec experienced a record-breaking wildfire season, compared to 2022. But researchers didn't find that asthma symptoms noticeably improved between 2023 and 2024, even though air quality got better."

The UVM researchers looked at particular matter that was smaller than 2.5 millionth of a letter, or PM 2.5. "That can be especially challenging to dispel from lungs, and especially irritating to those airways....There is research that shows that exposure to wildfire smoke can have much longer-term impacts, including development of asthma, especially for early exposure as a child," Maassel told Grist. 

Children with asthma usually have fewer attacks in the summer because they're not in school where they're constantly exposed to respiratory viruses and indoor triggers. 

Since wildfire smoke is usually a summer thing, children with asthma might not get the break they historically did if this smoke becomes a regular occurrence. Climate change is making Canadian springs and summers hotter and in some cases drier, creating the conditions for wildfires. The western U.S. is getting more prone to larger wildfires, too. 

So it looks like we need to start getting used to smoky summers almost everywhere in the United States.

On top of that, Grist notes, climate change is making growing seasons longer, means plants can produce more pollen. That pollen can exacerbate asthma and other chronic respiratory diseases. More bad news for asthma sufferers.

Wildfire smoke isn't just all about particles. As smoke travels long distanced, it produces ozone, which can irritate the lung and worsen asthma. Other icky things, like formaldehyde can evolve in traveling wildfire smoke, too. 

Like most research, the UVM wildfire smoke research begets more questions and more studies. 

Per Vermont Public:

"Maassel said more research is needed to understand why children's asthma wasn't better controlled in 2024. It's possible, she said, that the wildfire exposures of 2023 had a lingering impact.

The researcher said she's also interested in studying who is most impacted by smoke pollution - and what practical solutions public health officials can offer people to help protect them. Often, health officials tell vulnerable people to go inside and turn on their central air when air quality goes down. But few Vermonters have that option."

This goes well beyond Vermont, of course, The smoke attacks from Canada in 2023 and the western United States in other recent years, affected most of the population of the U.S.  As wildfires grow every year, will it contribute to a general decline in the nation's health? 

Huge Plume Of Dense Smoke From Kentucky Plane Crash Tragedy Tracked On Radar

National Weather Service
doppler radar detected the
huge smoke plume from
the plane crash near
Louisville, Ky
yesterday. The smoke looks
like an elongated rainstorm
spreading north toward
southern Indiana. 

The tragic plane crash yesterday in Louisville, Kentucky was made even worse by the massive amounts of jet fuel involved.  

That burning jet fuel, and burning oil from a petroleum recycling plant that was hit by the crash, created one of the most intense smoke plumes I can remember. At least aside from big wildfires and volcanoes. 

The McDonnell Douglas MD-11 UPS cargo plane was taking off from Louisville en route to Honolulu when it crashed into an industrial area during the late afternoon rush hour. 

At last report, nine people were reported dead and up to 16 are missing. At least 11 people are injured. There were three people aboard the plane, meaning the rest of the casualties were victims on the ground. 

The plane, and exploding jet fuel slammed into several businesses. Kentucky Gov. Andy Beshear said one of the businesses, Kentucky Petroleum Recycling, was hit "pretty directly," as he put it. 

This implies that in addition to the 38,000 gallons of jet fuel, weighing 233,000 pounds on the ill-fated plane, a large quantity of some type of petroleum products were at the business that was hit. The plane itself was carrying as many as 20,000 packages. 

Video images also showed dozens of cars on fire after the crash. 

All this created epic amounts of thick, black smoke. The wind was blowing from the south at about 7 mph, so the huge plume billowed northward. The smoke plume passed downtown Louisville just to the east, and greyed out the sky in the city's northern and eastern suburbs and on into southern Indiana.

The smoke was so dense and so extensive that National Weather Service radar showed the plume extending more than 20 miles from northwest of Okolona, Kentucky on up to River Bluff, in southern Indiana. 

Other than in large forest fires, it's unusual for weather radar to track a plume of smoke over that distance. Most fires don't create enough smoke to create as big a return on Doppler radar. 

The smoke was so thick that a shelter in place notification was in effect for a time from the airport all the way north to the Ohio River. 

A satellite system designed to detect heat from forest fires (helping firefighters assess the intensity and direction of fires) detected the explosion and blaze from the Louisville plane crash. 

The pixels in the heat detecting satellite are large, but even if a very small portion of that area is burning, the satellite imagery can detect it and display it as a large gray square. A loop in this link shows the initial dark square south of downtown Louisville at about the time of the crash. The grey square fades as the fire begins to subside. 

As horrible as this plane crash was, it could have been worse. The crashing plane narrowly missed a convention center where people were gathering for a livestock show. The crash also just missed the crowded bar and restaurant. Staff and patrons got out safely. The crash also just missed a huge Ford assembly plant with hundreds of workers inside.

Video:

Aerial video of the crash aftermath shows the extent of fire and smoke billowing over the Louisville area. Click on this link to view, or if you see the image below, click on that. 

 

Deep Dive Into Canadian Fires/Smoke: Canada Nightmare, Dangerous Smoke, Climate Change and Politics

Wildfire smoke from Canada turns the evening sun into
just a red dot over Georgia, Vermont on 
August 3, 2025. 

 It's been a smoky summer here in Vermont and much of the rest of the United States because, as you've already heard. Canada is burning again. 

It's the third year in a row that Canada has experienced unprecedented fires. So far, as of earlier this week, 16 million acres have burned, and the fires rage on. Last year, about 13 million Canadian acres burned. 

In 2023, the big, bad year for Canadian fires, nearly 40 million acres went up in smoke. That year, and now this year, are several times worse than each of the other Canadian fire years on record. 

Down here in Vermont, we'd seen smoky days before. Usually from Canadian fires. But in 2023 we entered a whole new world, thanks to Canada's fiery new reality.  Two years ago, many of the big fires north of the border were close by,  in Quebec. 

Since the smoke didn't have far to go to bother us, so it was pretty thick by the time it crossed the border into Vermont. 

This year, Quebec isn't causing the problem. In July, that province had the lowest number of fires in the past 10 years, CBC News reported.

As of Tuesday, just five small fires were burning in Quebec. CBC continues: "The province has seen around 170 fires so far this year, which is more than 200 fewer than the 10-year average,,,,,,In 2023, over 4.5 million hectares of forest burned in  Quebec, compared to 3,000 hectares so far this year."

Much of Quebec just had a super dry heat wave, and prospects for a lot more rain up there are fairly slim.  Quebec forests might be on the verge of bursting into flames.

Some of the fires are burning in unexpected areas. Newfoundland has been oddly hit hard, as you wouldn't expect that stormy, chilly corner of the world to catch on fire all that much.

As of last week, three out of control fires burned near St. John's and in central Newfoundland St. John's is Newfoundland's biggest city with a population of about 110,000. Another fire recently started near  the south coast. 

The series of fires in Newfoundland have prompted evacuations for the past several weeks. More people might well need to flee this week.  Several homes have already been lost to the Newfoundland flames. 

As of August 6, this year was already Canada's
second worst wildfire year on record. 

More people are awaiting possible evacuation alerts as three out-of-control wildfires continue to burn throughout Conception Bay and central Newfoundland, and a fourth fire has ignited in Red Harbour on the Burin Peninsula.  

Oddly hot, dry weather has hit Newfoundland over the past week or two.  One town in Newfoundland hit 98 degrees last week, the province's hottest temperature on record.  

 HEALTH EFFECTS 

As of August 6, Montreal had been under air quality alerts five times so far this year, They got through last year with no such alerts, In 2023, Montreal was under air quality alerts on 19 days. 

Air quality alerts have been piling up in the United States, of course. You alway see tips on how to keep yourself safe from the smoke,  But there's really no escape from it. 

Wildfire smoke is obviously not good for us to breathe.    On days when the air quality index is around 100 to 200, it's similar to smoking a quarter to a half pack of cigarettes a day, May-Lin Wilgus, a pulmonologist and professor at UCLA told NPR.  

That's bad enough for healthy people.  Emergency room visits skyrocket during smoky periods. During the Canadian wildfires two years ago, emergency room visits for asthma in the U.S increased by almost 20 percent.

Wildfire smoke can exacerbate cardiovascular illnesses. Evidence is also growing the smoke can cause a higher risk of developing dementia.

Prospects for smoke clearing anytime soon are dim. The smoke from Canada has thinned, at least for now. But now, much of the western United States is bursting into flames, and that smoke will no doubt make cross country trips through the Midwest and East.  

The smoke probably won't entirely clear until the snow flies.      

POLITICIANS PLAY WITH FIRE

 True to form, U.S. politicians are sticking their noses into the Canadian wildfires, because they smell political MAGA talking points along with the smoke. So we get sad, silly moments like the following:  

Per CBC:

"In a Wednesday news release, Wisconsin state Rep. Calvin Callahan joined other Republican state lawmakers from Iowa, Minnesota and North Dakota in filing a formal complaint against Canada to U.S. Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Lee Zeldin and the International Joint Commission."

New York Congresswoman Elise Stefanik also weighed in, sending letter to Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney telling him, "The scale and severity of these fires continues to raise concerns about Canada's fires management and lack of effective deterrence of human caused fires."

I guess these Republicans are maybe suggesting Canada simply rake its forests like Donald Trump said California should do. Because cleaning and removing leaves, fallen trees, dead trees and more from  the nearly million square miles of forests in Canada is as simple as raking your front lawn in October right?

Forest management is of course a serious topic. It's just that Canada's vast, remote forests can't effectively be managed like many in the United States. Those Canadian forests are just not accessible enough for tree thinning and that sort of thing 

These Republicans are also kissing Trump's ass, trying to pretend to be in agreement that the U.S. should take over Canada as our 51st state so we can "do it right."

Never mind that climate change has increased the chances that Canada's forests will burn every summer.

"We're seeing the effects of prolonged drought, of a lot less snow in the wintertime, leading to drier soils, drier conditions and the early onset of the fire season in the spring," University of Vermont Professor of Forest, Ecology and Forestry recently told WCAX.

By the way, Stefanik, Trump and many other MAGA Republicans support greater use of fossil fuel and cuts to EPA rules that aim to tamp down climate change

If Republicans were honest, we'd keep our own house in order U.S. currently has a growing list of its own wildfires, many of which continue to expand and worsen as I write this. 

Manitoba Premier Wab Kinew said U.S. Republicans were throwing a "timber tantrum," with their whining about the Canadian wildfire smoke. 

"These are attention-seekers who can't come up with a good idea on health care or on making life more affordable... so they're playing games with something that's very serious."

I also noticed the MAGA politicians have shut their traps in recent days as Canadian smoke waned and western United States wildfires rapidly gained ground. 

Maybe we should send Callahan, Stephanik to manage our western forest, or as their god would say, rake those forests. 

Stepping Down Unevenly Into Cooler Vermont/New England Weather Pattern. Drought Continues

A hazy sun sets over St. Albans, Vermont Wednesday.
It was the last time until next spring the sun set at or 
later than 8 p.m. True to the season, cooler 
weather is due by next week. 

 If you don't like hot weather, the good news is you probably won't see anything like the heat we've seen in the past few days until next summer.  

It's getting toward the back half of August. Things will start to cool. We'll probably have more hot weather, but nothing like the mid and even upper 90s we saw this week. 

WEDNESDAY EXPLAINED

The beginning of the end of the heat came yesterday with the arrival of showers and thunderstorms. 

I got a little smug yesterday morning with my surprise and delight over some early morning showers here in St. Albans, Vermont but the joke was on me.  

That was pretty much it for me with the rain. St. Albans received 0.23 inches, with nothing coming down after noon. 

The showers in far northwest Vermont kept the skies cloudy and cooler much of the day and stabilized the atmosphere. It only got to 87 degrees in Burlington and 81 in Highgate. So no new showers developed during the day much north of Route 2.

Elsewhere in Vermont, Wednesday was another hot one. St. Johnsbury set a record high for the date with 95 degrees. Springfield made it to 94 degrees. Montpelier got to 90, missing the record high for the date by just one degree. 

Unlike in far northern Vermont, the heat allowed widespread showers and storms to develop, though most places had unimpressive amounts of rain. Burlington had about a third of an inch, which ended an unprecedented dry spell for August. It was the first time on record the first 12 days of the month were rain free. 

Elsewhere yesterday,  Montpelier managed to see a quarter inch of rain, and Springfield a half inch. St. Johnsbury could only muster 0.15 inches. 

Wednesday also proved you can get a flood alert in a drought. 

An area around Londonderry, Bellows Falls, Windham and some other communities in southeast Vermont were socked by storms that dumped up to around three inches of rain in a short period of time. The National Weather Service issued a flood advisory for that area for a time late Wednesday afternoon.

DROUGHT REMAINS

Wednesday's rain was not nearly enough to quench our thirst, and mostly dry weather looms.  But at least there's a little precipitation in the forecast.

Today is starting out muggy.  One weak cold front came through, another boundary temporarily stalled in northern New York. Neither front was enough to push the humidity that built up yesterday out.

A third cold front today will do the job. This last front is weak, and will produce at most isolated showers. But it will flush the humidity out. You'll notice the change in the air this afternoon. The decrease in humidity will be nice, but it will come with some wildfire smoke again. Can't escape that! 

The drier air means you'll sleep better tonight.  Dry air allows temperatures at night to cool rapidly, especially if skies are clear. That'll be the case, so expect lows to drop into the comfortable 50s.

Friday will also be a nice summer day with sunshine and highs hitting the low 80s. After a fairly comfortable Friday night, a brief squirt of hot, dry air will work in Saturday. Some of us could get to 90 again. The humidity will stay low, so the drying ground and fire danger will continue. 

The weekly U.S. Drought Monitor is released every Thursday. I'll file a report in this blog thingy after it comes out later today. It will be interesting to see how much worse things got in Vermont after what I'm calling Vermont's Death Valley Week. That hot, arid air was something!

"FAIR WEATHER" COMING

Next week, right on schedule we'll enter what I call "Fair Weather." Not "fair" as in fair skies, though we'll probably have plenty of that. But in Vermont, "Fair Weather" is the not quite summer, not quite fall type weather you at least used to see in late August and the opening days of September. 

That's when most of the county and local fairs come through the Green Mountain State.  Traditionally, the weather during these events is cooler than what you endure in high summer, but warmer than the crisp air you'd expect once we really get into fall.

Due to climate change, "Fair Weather" has not been happening as much in late August in the past decade or two.  Instead, it's been staying hot. So this year might be a nice throwback to tradition. 

A cold front Sunday will throw some showers our way, but it won't rain all day.  Next week will feature highs mostly in the low 70s north to mid and upper 70s Champlain Valley and south. Lows will get into the upper 40s, low 50s, that kind of neighborhood.

It's hard to tease out exactly what each day next week will be like this far in advance.  Weak disturbances could generate a little rain on one or two days, but the dry northwest flow will probably prevent any of the real soakers we need.

But I think we're now past the truly hot part of summer. 

Heat, Dry Weather Still Over-Performing In Vermont; At Least Two More Torrid Days Coming

Clear skies over Taylor Park in St. Albans, Vermont
Sunday afternoon.  Yes, it was a nice summer day
but HOT. And oddly dry for a 
New England heat wave, 

The heat over-performed in Vermont once again Sunday. In Burlington, the high got up to 95 degrees, about four degrees warmer than forecast. 

.Dry air allows temperatures to get a little higher than they would if it was more humid. 

And dry it was on Sunday. The sky was nearly cloudless, with just a small amount of lingering wildfire smoke in the atmosphere.

 It's odd to see a cloud-free sky in a heat wave around here, as the humidity that usually accompanies a New England heat wave will often generate towering clouds that turn into a few scattered cooling thunderstorms. 

But the high pressure was so strong, and the air so dry that we had now showers. No clouds. No cooling. Outside of Burlington it was hot everywhere in Vermont, St. Johnsbury got to 92 degrees. It was 93 in Springfield. There was no escaping the heat up in the mountains. The summit of Mount Mansfield was at 83 degrees. 

This has been a strangely dry heat wave so far.  Dew points were in the upper 50s during Sunday. That's normally considered comfortable, but actually temperatures were so hot it sort of nullified that "comfort."   A normal heat wave would bring us uncomfortable dew points well into the 60s or low 70s. 

That's why there wasn't any kind of heat advisory on Sunday.  It was a dry heat, as they might say in Arizona.  Not as bad as the humid East, supposedly.  But when that the humid East went dry this weekend, at least in Vermont, it still felt uncomfortably hot for us in the alleged Great White North.   

The relative humidity Sunday afternoon was around 32 percent in Burlington and much of the rest of Vermont. That's awfully low. The hot sun, the hot temperatures and that dry air really accelerated the developing drought in and around the Green Mountain State. 

Needless to say the fire danger in New England and southeast Canada continues to worsen.  Around here, the Vermont Department of Forests, Parks and Recreation today upgraded the fire danger in most of Vermont from "high" to "very high" which is somewhat rare designation.

If this keeps up, we're going to have to start worrying about crops quite soon, too.

HOT, DRY FORECAST

The dry, hot state of affairs will continue for at least two more days.  What appears to be our developing drought will continue on, despite the chances of a few showers and thunderstorms Wednesday. I'll get to those in a minute.

The humidity - dew point - has crept up a little since yesterday and will stay mostly in the low to mid 60s. 

It'll be interesting to see what that slightly higher but not ridiculous humidity does to actual temperatures. The National Weather Service is going for expected highs of 93 in Burlington both today and tomorrow. 

If those temperatures come to pass, that's marginally cooler than Sunday, but it will feel a bit worse.   It's enough to finally trigger a heat advisory in the Champlain Valley.  We'll barely meet the criteria for a heat advisory, as it will feel like it's in the mid-90s this afternoon.  

The heat advisory is on in part because the longer a hot spell goes on, the more effects it has on the human body.  This has been going on for a few days now, so it's wearing us out. Vermont outside the Champlain Valley doesn't quite qualify for a heat advisory, but just know you need to take it easy in today's weather, no matter where you are.  Tomorrow, too

Probably the best you can do is accidentally shoot yourself with your garden hose while watering your veggies and flowers.   There is no chance of any welcome, cooling showers today or tomorrow. Just lots of blast furnace sun.  

COLD FRONT

The cold front to end the heat is still due Wednesday. I am still unimpressed by the prospects of a lot of rain with this thing. Chances appear good that most of us will see some rain, but it won't be much.

It will temporarily get really, really humid Wednesday, which would make you think we're going to get blasted by torrents of rain. But the atmospheric dynamics don't seem to be there to generate lots of strong storms. 

There's probably a risk of a severe storm or two but that risk is low. NOAA's Weather Prediction Center even has us in a marginal (very low) risk of flash flooding Wednesday, which might seem surprising. 

It's possible but pretty unlikely that one or two spots could get a torrential enough downpour to cause some minor washouts, that sort of thing.

 But even the lucky few that get a good downpour won't benefit much. Any local torrents won't last long, and won't have a chance to soak into the ground. As I mentioned yesterday, we need a slow, steady rain to undo the dustiness and lack of water underfoot, and in our streams, rivers and wells. 

After Wednesday, it's right back to the super low humidity and sunshine. That'll probable last Thursday through Saturday. At least the air temperature Thursday and Friday will be reasonable, with highs near 80s and lows in the 50s amid that dry air. 

There's a chance of another weak front with lame, scattered showers Sunday, but that doesn't look impressive either. That Sunday thing looks like it might be followed by another batch of dry high pressure from central Canada.

Since those two cold fronts will introduce air from central Canada, we might have a couple more big smoke attacks amid the dry air. Those two new air masses, the first one on Thursday the next tentatively schedule to arrive a week from today, are coming from those places in Canada with the huge ongoing wildfires, 

So chances are, the relatively cool bursts of air won't make you breathe easy. Instead, it could well be more smoke and gunk and haze and yuck.  

Weird Vermont Wet Spots Amid Very Dry Week; Heat Wave Looms

National Weather Service radar from around 6:15 a.m. 
today showed slow moving showers and downpours
in southern Vermont. While most of us are bone
dry, a few isolated places are picking up a lot of
rain. More widely scattered storms all day today.

 As you know, I've been harping about how dry it's getting out there, and how the forest fire danger is rising and all that.  

That's all still very true. 

Interspersed with the dryness is some isolated very wet spots. It's the strange winners/losers situation we sometimes see in the summer. 

The few showers and thunderstorms developed Wednesday, just as they did Tuesday. Almost all of them were in central and southern Vermont. 

The storms that got going moved very slowly,  managing to dump quite a bit of rain on just a couple spots. There's not much in the way of specific reports, since most of the showers and storms have avoided major reporting stations. 

But there are isolated spots in New England that are soggy amid an overall dry spell. Lebanon, New Hampshire, just over the border from White River Junction has 0.83 inches of rain in a late Wednesday afternoon thunderstorm.   

Just over the Vermont border in the Berkshires of Massachusetts, as much as 1.75 inches of rain fell Wednesday.

A patch of rain early this morning over far southern Green Mountains east of Bennington and southwest of Springfield this morning has surely dumped at least a half inch if not more in a few towns down there. I say that because those storms were just sitting there, hardly moving.

We'll continue that state of affairs today. 

More thunderstorms will erupt today here and there. With nothing to steer the storms, some might sit over the same spot for quite a while. So, though the risk is very low, there could be one or two pinpoint spots maybe in the central and southern Green Mountains that could have a local minor flash flood. 

 The chances of you seeing a thunderstorm today is pretty low,  probably not much better than 30 percent, if that. They could pop up almost anywhere, based on just local breezes, the remnants of old storms or subtle ripples in the atmosphere. There's really no real weather front or storm to kick off anything. Just August summertime doldrums. 

The more likely spots are in the Adirodacks and Green Mountains, where the slopes create the start of the updrafts needed to get storms going. There could be some storms near the western shore of Lake Champlain, where a breeze off the lake might interact with updrafts along the eastern edge of the Adirondacks. 

I'll emphasize that at least 99 percent of us will have no trouble. And the majority of us will see another day with no rain at all.  So, while it pours like hell in one or two towns, the rest of Vermont and surrounding areas continue to endure our dusty, smoky weather.  

SMOKE/HEAT

Other than the isolated thunderstorms and downpours, the trend now is for slowly decreasing smoke and noticeably increasing heat. 

The smoke is still sitting over us, with no place to go, no real wind to flush it out.

National Weather Service calling for moderate
to major heat wave in the Northeast. This map
is for Monday. Red areas will be the most
uncomfortable relative to local averages. 

 But the air is slowly getting better as the smoke particles continue to slowly fall out of the sky. 

Air quality alerts have expired, but some pollution remains, so it's not clean and refreshing out there. This slow trend toward less smoke will continue, but it'll stay hazy out there into the weekend. 

The real story is the heat coming in. That big high pressure system that's been over Quebec is now moving off the New England coast. It'll work in concert with the famous summertime Bermuda high to pump hot air our way. 

This hot air will last awhile,

The warmup has already started. Wednesday was a couple degrees warmer than Tuesday. This mornings readings were was a couple higher than yesterday's dawn, but still comfortable, 

Each day today through Monday will be a little hotter than the day before. An example, forecast daily highs today through Tuesday go as follows: 83, 85, 88, 91, 94, 92.  Nights will grow increasingly uncomfortable as we head into the weekend. 

So yea, hot. The humidity will also slowly increase, and will become pretty oppressive by early this week, The strong high pressure means sinking air, so the will suppress the chances for showers and storms Friday through Monday. 

That doesn't mean there won't be any widely scattered storms through that period. It just means if any do manage to get going, they'll be few, far between and brief.

It looks like a weak cold front still wants to approach us about next Tuesday, Judging from the forecasts, I'm still pretty unimpressed with what the front will look like. It probably won't bring temperatures down all that much, and I still question how much rain it might bring. 

 

Wednesday Morning In Vermont, Smoke Clears A Little, Summer Weather Rolls On

This morning's air pollution map form iqair.com show
improved air in northern New England (green dots) as
the worst of the smoke is suppressed to our south
and west for now, Air quality alerts are still in effect
across central and southern Vermont. 

 This morning was actually a pretty pleasant, cool start to the day in Vermont, especially in the northern half of the state. 

The smoke is greatly diminished in the north so the air quality alert is off the table  up there. 

Air quality up here is actually pretty damn good. For now, anyway,  Further south, that alert is still in effect, though the smoke isn't as thick as it was. Air quality in southern Vermont is moderate. 

Part of the reason for the better air is the remnants of that weak cold front that arrived from Quebec Monday.  

The front is now barely discernible, but it's there, hanging out in somewhere near or south of Rutland and White River Junction.  

To the north, not only is it less smoky, it's a little cooler and less humid than in southern Vermont. I noticed Newport was at 49 degrees this morning while most of the rest of the north was in the low to mid 50s - just a touch cooler than average for early August. 

Meanwhile, in the smokier south, temperatures were near 60 or so.

TODAY/TOMORROW

That old front will influence our weather in subtle ways today, just as it did on Tuesday. 

Yesterday, the front helped set off a few widely scattered thunderstorms mostly along and south of Route 4. A slow moving one in southwest New Hampshire actually managed to prompt a fairly brief severe storm and flood warning for small area down there.

Rinse and repeat today, with a few thunderstorms and showers in the southern half of Vermont today. One or two could pop up in the north, too, but chances are even lower up there.  Whoever does get rain is damn lucky. It's dry out there. 

Speaking of rinse and repeat, tomorrow should be nearly a carbon copy to today. On both days, the isolated storm won't be severe, and really don't pose a local flood hazard, even though they will be slow moving. We could have a scenario in which 90 percent of us get no rain or just a few hundredths of an inch at best, while parts of one or two towns get close to an inch.

Temperatures both days should be close to normal for this time of year, with highs within a few degrees either side of 80 with lows in the 50s most places, low 60s in the warmer valleys. 

The smoke will keep lingering, and even maybe drift back into northern Vermont. But the smoke is  thinner than it was, as the particles slowly fall out of the air.  

Big wildfires are still belching a hell of a lot of smoke up in Canada. The western United States is now also contributing to that mess as fires grow in number and size out there.  

However, for the next couple of days anyway, the winds are not blowing any new smoke into New England. We'll have more very smoky days this summer, I'm sure, bur the worst of this episode is over. 

HEATING UP

Temperatures and humidity have been pretty nice the past few days.  It hasn't been sweaty.  Days have been warm but management, early mornings have been cool. It's just the smoke that's been bothersome. Today and tomorrow look comfortable, too, but don't get used to it. Hot times are coming. 

You'll really start to notice it Friday as temperatures get well up into the 80s. By the weekend and early next week, many of us will be above 90 degrees each afternoon.  The humidity won't be too bad at first, but will slowly increase through the weekend.  It'll feel truly ugly out there by early next week. 

This hot spell looks to last awhile, but how long and how intense is anybody's guess.  For what it's worth, long range forecasts keep us warmer than normal most of the time through at least August 19.  

Smoke Continues To Sting Vermont, And Many Other Areas As Heat Wave (Eventually) Looms

Visible satellite photo from Monday afternoon showed
most of the wildfire smoke sandwiched between a weak
cold front in southern Quebec and another weak
front in Pennsylvania. That milkiness in the image
between those two cloud bands is smoke. 

 The wildfire smoke goes on and on here in Vermont and in much of the United States and southern Canada, and we're still choking this morning. 

The air quality alert persists in the Green Mountain State through midnight tonight. Other areas around the Great Lakes, the Northeast, parts of Texas, and of course Canada also remain under these alerts. 

Writing in Facebook, WCAX-TV meteorologist Gunnar Consul said the air quality index in Burlington was reported as low as 141 Monday, the second worst this year and the fifth worst on record since 2000. 

Spending four hours outdoors Monday in Vermont was the equivalent of smoking half a cigarette, Consul wrote.  

The smoke is still around today, and will be for awhile yet. 

A weak cold front has temporarily improved the air quality right along the Canadian border early this morning, where the air quality was regarded as "moderate."  And I mean right along and north of the border. Outside my St. Albans house, 15 or so miles south of the border, it was still awfully hazy out as I wrote this around 7 a.m. today. 

Elsewhere in and near Vermont, it was still "unhealthy for sensitive groups."

VERMONT FORECAST

The air will stay bad region wide today and tomorrow. For now, there' s no new smoke blowing in from Canada. But the air that's over us isn't going anywhere. The air will very slowly improve over the next two or three days only because all those tiny smoke particles that are getting in our lungs are slowly falling out of the sky.  There is no wind to push the smoky air away. 

We're in kind of a  holding pattern while strong high pressure pretty much stalls over Quebec and New England through Thursday. 

Aside from the smoke, this weirdly strong for August high pressure system has kept temperatures around here  pretty comfortable. Readings for the past few days have been close to normal for this time of year and will pretty much remain that way through Thursday. 

Reasonable humidity has also allowed nights to cool off comfortably. It was in the 50s to near 60 at dawn again today. Expect the same tomorrow morning and maybe Thursday morning, too.  Today might actually be a couple degrees cooler than the low 80s we saw Monday. 

That very weak cold front that staggered unnoticed into Vermont yesterday is still around and fading. Its remnants and a bit of atmospheric moisture that found its way in from the Atlantic Ocean means there should be a few widely scattered showers and garden variety thunderstorms every afternoon today through Thursday.

We could all use the rain, but the vast majority of us will get nothing. A very few lucky devils, especially near the Green Mountains of Vermont, White Mountains of New Hampshire and the Adirondacks could get a brief downpour. A few more of us could see sprinkles from dying showers moving off the mountains. 

Overall, though, the rather high forest fire danger will continue on.

LATE WEEK/WEEKEND

That strong high pressure that's hanging around us will move offshore by the end of the week. That opens the door to a blast of hot air that will come in from the southwest. Temperatures could flirt with 90 degrees Friday in the warmest valleys. 

Ninety degree temperatures look even more widespread Saturday, Sunday and probably Monday. If anything, that high pressure will strengthen further, which would mostly shut off any chances of scattered showers and storms, despite slowly increasing humidity. 

The next chance of rain at all looks to be next Tuesday.  The forecast could change, but I'm not impressed by what's coming Tuesday, so I don't expect a lot of rain. I'm also doubting that thing on Tuesday will cool us off all that much.  

Air Quality Still Crappy In Most Of U.S., Canada Including Vermont As Wildfires Rage

Wildfire smoke from Canada turned the setting sun over
Georgia, Vermont on Sunday into a weird, red dot.
The dot eventually disappeared in the smoke before
reaching the horizon. 

After choking our way through a smoky Sunday, we'll do the same today - here in Vermont and in huge swaths of the United States and Canada.  

Forests across much of Canada and parts or the United States West   are burning ferociously, having dried out in a long, and in many cases hot summer. 

In the Great Lakes and Northeast, and in central and southeast Canada,  the smoke is stuck beneath sprawling, stalled high pressure.  There's nothing coming along to produce a wind shift to flush the crud out.  

Instead, this week, we'll have to wait for the smoke particles to gradually precipitate out of the air to ever so slowly improve the air quality to something other than gross. 

If we eventually do see a change in the weather pattern, it could backfire. Perhaps weather fronts would grab new batches of smoke from the still-raging fires in central Canada and send them to populated areas.

Meanwhile, wildfires are increasing in the United States West, which are also starting to contribute to the bad air. This is turning out to be a rough month for those of us who like to breathe. 

For now, as of this Monday morning, air quality alerts are up in parts of Colorado, all of Wisconsin, Michigan and New York, and almost all of New England. Not to mention huge chunks of Canada. Major global cities in the top ten list of worst air this morning included Detroit, Michigan and Toronto and Montreal, Canada. 

VERMONT SMOKE/WEATHER

This morning's map from IQAir.com shows a band of
bad air across northern New England and southern
Quebec. Click on the image to make it 
bigger and easier to see. 

Here in Vermont, most of the state remains under an air quality alert. The alert that was to expire at midnight last night was extended to at least midnight tonight. 

Early this morning, Bennington and Windham counties were exempted, for now anyway, as the air is marginally cleaner there.

The air over the past couple of days hasn't been the worst it's been this year. We've had moments, like on July 26, where it was incredibly bad, much worse than it is now. But that's not exactly great news. Our latest batch of bad air is seemingly lasting forever. 

Since Saturday, the air has generally and persistently been in the orange "unhealthy for sensitive groups" category since Saturday.  Sometimes it flirts with the red, unhealthy for everybody zone. 

But really, even the unhealthy for sensitive groups doesn't mean the perfectly fine, fitness specimens among us aren't being affected. That persistence that's troubling. The longer you breathe bad air the worse it is for everybody. 

A weak cold front today and tonight won't do much to disperse the smoke.  If the cold front goes far enough south, the air near the Canadian border might temporarily get a little better. The center of strong high pressure in central and northern Quebec has - for now  - clean air under it, so some of that better air might sneak in late today before the smoke returns tonight.

SMOKE AS FOG MACHINE

This time of year, we often see early morning fog form in the valleys. The fog gets less and less likely the longer you've gone without rain. Except when there's smoke. In their forecast discussion,  National Weather Service/South Burlington meteorologist Tyler Danzig gave us an excellent explanation as to why smoke encourages morning fog:

"Canadian wildfire smoke is the culprit for fog development with all other signs pointing to no fog Increased cloud condensation nuclei from the smoke acts as a binding agent, similar to butter and eggs in cooking for water molecules. As it cools overnight, the can collect and condense the moisture more easily than normal air molecules, leading to enhanced fog development."

So yes, we're experience the joys of smoggy mornings lately. Get used to it, I guess. I expect more of this as long as the smoke lingers. 

REST OF THE WEATHER

Dry and warm with an increasing home grown fire danger is the story for the next week at least. 

That weak cold front coming through later today will stall across central New England and dissipate. It has almost no moisture to work with so don't expect any rain. For most of us. It might help squeeze out isolated showers and storms each afternoon today through Thursday,  mostly in the high elevations of southern and central Vermont.

These will produce little rain, and the vast majority of us will stay dry. This type of weather pattern makes me wonder about the risk of "dry lightning." That's from thunderstorms that produce little rain but do generate lightning strikes that can set forest fires. They're common in the West, but more rare here. But I can see that happening in this weather pattern.  

The wicked strong high pressure will keep deeply humid air at bay for most of the week, which would make forests dry out faster in Vermont than we usually see in August.  

The high pressure will also keep super hot weather away from us for the next few days. Daytime temperatures will be in the 80 to 85 degree range for most of us through Thursday, with lows fairly comfortable in the 55 to 62 degree range, give or take.

That's only slightly warmer than average for this time of year. Hotter, and maybe more humid air looks like it might start making a run at us toward Friday or the weekend. 

Oh, one more thing. It did not rain at all in Burlington this weekend. So the record for most consecutive weekend with precipitation stops at 32.  The last time before these past two days we had a rain or snow-free weekend was on December 14-15, 2024.

Sunday Vermont Update: The Smoke Is Back, And How Dry We Are, And Will Be

Image from firesmoke.ca  shows smoke from fires in
central Canada is spreading far and wide in
North America, including here in Vermont 

The smoke is back. 

And it will probably harass us off and on all week while rain (mostly) stays resolutely away from the Green Mountain State. 

Oddly strong high pressure will take the blame and the credit for a long period of dry weather, often smoky skies and warm summer weather. 

Saturday started off pretty clear but the haze thickened through the day. The thickest smoke stayed aloft, but some of the pollution, inevitably, made it to the ground. Evening was a hazy mess, at least in northern parts of the state.

Canada has gotten even smokier as fires have intensify and grown widespread in central parts of that vast nation. New, large fires have also exploded in the Northwest Territories and Nunavut.

There's now a hell of a lot of smoke belching into the skies above North America. 

This is a widespread smoke attack. Air quality alerts have been in effect for a few days, and remain on in places like Michigan, Minnesota and Wisconsin.    Most of Maine and the northern half of New Hampshire joined the air quality alert party Saturday afternoon, warning residents that most of today would be smoky.

By late Saturday afternoon, the National Weather Service office in Burlington, in their forecast discussion, were already monitoring the smoke, which had already turned our skies hazy and greyed out some of our Green Mountain views.

Before dinnertime, the Vermont Agency of Natural Resources issued our own air quality alert.  

TODAY 

That bad air alert is now in effect at least until midnight tonight. The breezes, which had been from the north, have shifted to the south. That will keep the worst of the air toward northern Vermont. The smoke will be even thicker up in Quebec and Ontario.

Still there is some air flow aloft coming from the opposite direction - the north, which would bring more smoke our way.  High pressure systems feature sinking air, so some of that smoke aloft will make it down here to the ground, where we all live and breathe.

The bottom line is that air quality was moderate to unhealthy for sensitive groups this morning.  That already kinda bad air might worsen a little more through the day,  but will not be as bad as the abysmal air quality we endured on July 26.

It'll still be a little rough on the lungs, though.     

Otherwise, another comfortably cool morning will morph into a warm, sunny, if hazy day.  The humidity will stay perfectly reasonable, 

MONDAY

 Weather systems - both storms and areas of fair, sunny weather - tend to be weak this time of year.  But high pressure is growing over Quebec and New England.

This high pressure will be at near record strength for August. It's more typical of the super strong high pressures that give us periods of Indian Summer weather in October if we get lucky. High pressure means sinking air. Sinking air means it's really hard for rain clouds to form. Hence the very dry forecast. 

The southern end of this high pressure over New England is weakening in favor of a center over Quebec. This will send a weak cold front our way tomorrow.  

The air is so dry that at most the front might produce isolated light showers. More than 90 percent of us won't see any rain at all. The very few of us that do see raindrops will get only a trace to maybe a couple hundredths of an inch, Not even enough to wet things down at all. 

The front will bring another wave of smoke with it. so I anticipate some possible new air quality alerts this week. Highs should make it into the 80s again. 

REST OF WEEK

The high pressure will sit strong all week, only slowly dropping south from Quebec through New England between now and next weekend. It's huge, and will extend down as far south as Georgia this week. 

Monday's cold front will make Tuesday a degree or two "cooler" with highs "only" in the 78 to 84 degree range for most of us. 

The orientation of the high, and the fact that it pushed last week's cold front almost all the way to the Gulf Coast. That will deep tropical humidity away from us probably at least through the end of the week. 

That means the air will stay fairly comfortable (aside from any smoke).  I suppose an isolated shower or two could figure out a way to develop over the mountains on one or two afternoons this week, but almost everybody will stay dry. 

We might, maybe could get a bit of a break from the smoke later in the week. Southerly winds in the worst often fire zone in Manitoba and Saskatchewan later this week might temporarily drive most of the smoke north into Nunavut and western Hudson Bay.  

Back here in Vermont, the odd August combination of daily sunshine, sort of low humidity and warm temperatures sets the stage for a growing forest fire risk.

The brush fire risk was already high in the Champlain Valley this weekend, and I imagine the moderate risk on most of the rest of the state will increase to high this week. Watch those campfires, cigarette butts and backyard burns. 

Also, unlikely but possible is the risk of a flash drought.  

This is a weird, long stretch of dry weather with a lack of humidity, quite uncharacteristic of August. If this continues all month, then we have to start worrying about too-dry conditions and possible drought.

It's too early to sound the alarm on that. We could still get a lot of rain starting mid month, we just don't know yet. But I already have to water my gardens thoroughly today for the first time this summer, and that state of affairs should continue. 

The next chance of any more widespread showers looks to be a week from tomorrow, and even that looks iffy at this point.  

Monday Morning Weather: Dangerous Storms Northern Plain: Here In Vermont, Kinda Hot, Smoky As Late Week Dry Spell Looms

A destructive derecho is possible in the northern Plains
today especially in the orange and red areas on map,

While some areas of the nation continue to experience some odd, extreme and often dangerous weather, we in Vermont have settled into a sometimes foggy, sometimes humid, sometimes very warm and changeable weather pattern. 

More on Vermont in a minute, but we should get into some of the big weather headlines from yesterday. 

TAMPA HEAT

Tampa, Florida made local history by reaching 100 degrees, the first time that's happened since they started keeping track there in around 1890.

It might seem surprising that Tampa had never been 100 degrees. After all, July in Florida is hot.

It sure is. But in Tampa, humid sea breezes usually come in off the Gulf of Mexico. Those breezes collide with even hotter air just inland to produce pretty much daily thunderstorms. The sea breeze and the storms have always prevented Tampa from reaching 100 degrees until now,

Those sea breeze thunderstorms did eventually develop in Tampa  yesterday, but the overall air mass was so hot, tthey were able to reach 100 degrees. We'll never know for sure, but perhaps climate change was ale to push Tampa to 100 degrees. 

NORTHERN PLAINS EXTREME STORMS

We've been talking about the so-called heat dome in the middle of the nation, causing the sweltering, sometimes near record temperatures across the Midwest and East.

Severe storms often ride along the northern edge of these heat domes, and that's happening big time.

Several batches of storms have already battered the Upper Midwest in recent days. A somewhat out of season large tornado touched down Sunday west of Watertown, South Dakota. Winds in Watertown itself gusted to 71 mph. 

The same batch of storms helped create another tornado in western Minnesota, along with a string of wind damage and flash flooding reports across much of Minnesota, eastern South Dakota and northern Iowa,

Today looks even worse. Forecasters expect a dangerous derecho to develop somewhere in South Dakota. A derecho is a long-lasting band of intense, fast-moving thunderstorms with destructive winds. These things can cover many hundred of miles. 

This one could affect much of South Dakota, a good chunk of Minnesota and northern Iowa. Derechos are hard to predict, but conditions are favorable for one of these today. A worst-case scenario - which could conceivably happen - will be like the August 10, 2020 Iowa derecho.

In that case, a derecho roared across Iowa, causing straight line winds of up to 140 mph in Cedar Rapids, the highest winds ever recorded in a derecho. It was also the most destruction thunderstorm in U.S. history, causing $11 billion in damage.

Which is why we're hoping today's event falls well short of that, 

VERMONT RAIN

My St. Albans, Vermont gardens have that ragged,
crowded late summer look now, but at least there's
still some color

Luckily, nothing like a derecho is expected here in Vermont. We're safe. 

Many of us in Vermont managed to get a decent rainfall Sunday.  Parts of southern Vermont - as expected - got drenched nicely. Bennington reported a total of 1.39 inches. 

Unexpectedly, as we talked about yesterday, far northern Vermont saw a band of heavy rain during much of the morning. My unofficial rain gauge in St. Albans, Vermont collected an impressive 1.35 inches of rain. 

St. Johnsbury reported 1.12 inches of rain.

Central Vermont missed out somewhat. Rainfall amounted to 0.4 inches in Burlington, 0,47 inches in Montpelier, and 0.67 inches in Rutland, where an isolated late afternoon/early evening thunderstorm added to the total, 

The rain was welcome, as much of the state except the Northeast Kingdom and parts of northwest Vermont have been a little on the dry side this month, 

So far, unlike most of the state, my area around St. Albans has had a wet month. I've collected right around 6.5 inches of rain so far this month.

Very little rain is expected this week, And it's looking like starting Thursday, , we could go as much as a week without any rain. That would be the longest dry spell we've had since last September.

THE FORECAST

Dense fog enveloped much of Vermont early this morning. I'm sure that slowed the morning commute in some areas. That will have burned off most places by the time you read this. 

Today

A northwest air flow that will eventually bring us our cooler, less humid air has already started. It'll just take awhile for the truly refreshing, very dry air to reach us. 

It was super muggy this morning, but the northwest breeze should lower our humidity a bit this afternoon. It'll still be on the sweaty side, but not the worst it could be.

Still, temperatures should get well into the 80s, and maybe even flirt with 90 degrees again in a few spots, And that damn wildfire smoke will be back. The smoke probably won't be as bad as it was Saturday, but it will still diminish air quality some.

Little disturbances in the air flow will keep very low chances of showers and storms going, but I emphasize very low. There might be something up by the Canadian border tonight, but don't count on it.

Tuesday

Tuesday looks hot and somewhat humid, with just a very low chance of storms. At least 90 percent of us shouldn't see anything at all, unless something in the forecast radically changes overnight.  A few towns should get close to 90 degrees again, the rest of us will be in the 80s. 

On the bright side, it looks like the smoke might diminish somewhat tomorrow. 

Wednesday

The most meaningful cold front in the series should come through sometimes Wednesday. It's too early to get into the details, but so far, I'm not impressed by the amount of rain or thunderstorms it looks like it will produce.

I suppose a few places might get lucky and see a good downpour. And, depending on the timing of the front, there might be a strong storm or two. But this won't be the severe weather event of the year. Nothing like South Dakota's anticipated derecho,

Dry Week?

That Wednesday cold front appears as if it will usher in that long dry spell. The high pressure coming down from Canada looks like it will be massive in size and slow moving.   It might not rain for seven or more consecutive days, though long range forecasts are always iffy, as I keep reminding everyone.

It will be cool at first, with that low humidity. Since the air will be coming from Canada, that cool air might end up being - sigh - smoky again. 

The cool weather looks like it won't last as long as many meteorologists had been thinking earlier. It now looks like only next Thursday, Friday and maybe Saturday will be cooler than average, and it won't be all that much chillier than you'd expect in early August.

Warmer summer weather will start to come back, probably next Sunday and stick around for awhile. The humidity will probably also return, at least to an extent.