Severe Weather Threat To Increase In Vermont, Rest Of New England This Afternoon

Gawd, it was hot and humid outside in Vermont when I stepped out for lunch at noontime.

As previously advertised, that heat and humidity is keeping us on track for another potential bout of severe thunderstorms later today. 

Under lots of sunshine, temperatures will top out at or above 90 in most lower elevations of Vermont this afternoon.

If severe storms develop in the Northeast today,
the most likely areas are shaded in yellow.
Not everyone will get a severe storm, but
a few towns might.

That sun, heat and humidity will make the air less stable, and all we'll need is a trigger to prompt storms to form and possibly to become severe. 

The question is will that trigger materialize. There is a disturbance and weak cold front sinking south from Ontario and Quebec and that might set things off later.

The National Weather Service in South Burlington, Vermont is not 100 percent sure the storms will get going, but the meteorologists there think they probably will. 

Computer models are not handling predictions of what might go on in the atmosphere over us later today and this evening, and that adds some uncertainty to the forecast.

It might be a bust and we get nothing, or things could get really bad in spots this evening. Best to keep an eye to the sky, just in case.

If storms do form,  they'll develop fast. So be prepared if you see some dark clouds or towering, billowing clouds starting to form later this afternoon.

That's because the way the atmosphere is set up today, some of the thunderstorm that form will likely go from  small shower nothing burgers to dangerous blast of damaging winds, torrential downpours, a lot of lightning and possibly big hail.

A few rogue storms could get going any time from now on today. (I'm writing this at 12:30 p.m.) But the most likely time for storms will start at roughly 4 p.m. and go into the late evening, say 10 p.m. or so.

Northern New York and the northern portions of Vermont, New Hampshire and Maine are the most likely targets if any severe storms develop. There's a lesser but still real chance if you go further south.

There's still a threat of some severe storms scattered about Saturday afternoon as well