Do Winter Hype Forecasts Kill The Ski Industry?

Stowe Mountain Resort posted this inviting photograph on Instagram
today. According to an Outside magazine article, ski areas like
Stowe often find themselves battling perceptions that weather
is too severe for skiing, which hurts the bottom line. 

When they tell you the wind chill is terrible, or the roads are glare ice or that you shouldn't travel because it's going to snow, do you cancel your plans?  

Often, that's a good thing to do. You don't want to be reckless.

To many others, this caution is not always a great thing. According to a recent article in Outside, over-hyped winter weather forecasts are damaging the ski industry. The article is worth the full read. 

According to Outside:

"'Negative weather reporting absolutely has an effect on ski area attendance,' says Kelly Pawlak, president of the National Ski Areas Association. It's especially true, she says, for smaller resorts near population centers that rely on the casual, two-or-three times per year skier. 'A negative report on Thursday can scrap a lot of upcoming wekeend ski plans for a resort that relies on day trips.'"

Anything that affects the ski industry here in Vermont is of course important. The Vermont Ski Areas Association said there were nearly 4 million skier days in the Green Mountain State last year, according to VTDigger.  A skier day is one person skiing one full day, which a standard way of counting business in the ski industry.

This winter has been good, so the number of recent visitors to Vermont might have gone up. We'll have to wait until the end of the season for statistics.

The Vermont Ski Areas Association says the industry creates about $900 million in direct spending, $120 million in taxes, reports VTDigger. The business supports 12,000 direct jobs and roughly 22,000 indirecrt jobs here.

Which leads us to the constant tension between reasonable warnings to people who would otherwise be careless with winter weather, and the tendency for many media outlets and weather geeks on social media to overhype winter cold and storms.

Ski enthusiasts tell Outside, and by extension the rest of us, that wind chill alerts are overdone. When you hear a forecast for 20 below wind chills, that doesn't mean it will constantly feel that cold out there. The 20 below "real feel" as some call it, come during peak gusts when the sun isn't out.

During these cold weather events, the wind chill is usually warmer than 20 below, plus the sun makes it feel a little warmer out. Plus, winter clothing is better than ever these days, shielding outdoor sports types from some of the worst weather winter can fling at us.

You've heard the saying: "It's not bad weather, it's bad clothing."  That logic is, if you get too cold and wet outdoors during the winter, it's because you're not wearing the right clothes.

Ski areas are lobbying meteorologists and other weather types about being careful with their winter forecasts and not being too negative.

Says Outside:

"In December, at one of the summits (to) combat negative winter weather reporting, the North American Snowsports Journalist Association organized an event for a dozen broadcast meteorologists at Stratton Mountain Resort (in Vermont).

The three-day event featured technical climate presentations, but also a discussion, led by a North Face employee, on layering, wind proofing, and other snowsports dress techniques. There was plenty of time for skiing and snowshoeing, too. 

The idea, says organizer Adam White, is to make weather journalists more comfortable with winter conditions and to reduce their bias on-air or even Instagram. 'Meteorologists are surprisingly popular on social media,' says White. 'Everyone wants to know about the weather.'"

In my opinion, there's a lot of things going on here. It's always complicated, and you're never going to make everybody happy.

First of all, there is indeed a tendency to overhype things, particularly on social media. Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and other platforms are rife with breathless reports of impending Blizzards of the Century. If you were to believe social media, the Blizzards of the Century come about once every hour.

Wind chill alerts become gloom and doom on social media, telling everyone that if they step outdoors for just one second in these conditions, they will magically turn into an ice cube from which they will never thaw.

The point is eyeballs and clicks. The more hype there is, the more potential clicks and the more money to be made. Social media is certainly not the most ethical place in the world.

On the other hand, Outside magazine caters mostly to people who know what they're doing. An experienced skiing, rider or snowshoe enthusiast, upon learning of a severe wind chill forecast, will just bring along the right gear and they'll be all set and happy.

But there's plenty of stupid people out there, too. You have to hammer home the dangers to people who think nothing of hopping into their cars in a light sweater when it's 30 below for a road trip in a blizzard. Then when they get stuck, they freeze, because they didn't prepare.

Still, the Outside article might prompt me to be a little more nuanced in my reports. Like most weather geeks, I get excited over the drama of storms and weather extremes. I try to keep it in my sneaker, but sometimes my thrill of the weather betrays me.

I can probably try to play to two audiences: One piece of my essays would play to the people who might not be so prepared for the weather, while the other side of me would tell people to go out and play in the extreme weather, if they're smart enough to do it.

God forbid I stop anyone from going out and playing in the snow if they can. Because frankly, the snow and ice that I can see out my window is a total waste unless we find a way to enjoy it.

Wintry Weather Continues. Cold, With New England Snow Threat Sunday/Monday?

Jackson the Weather Dog in his St. Albans, Vermont yard searches in vain
this morning for any sign of winter's end. He didn't find anything like that.
Something smelled interesting under the snow to his left, though. 

Last night's light snowfall played out exactly as expected. The expected a dusting near the Canadian border, and I got 0.3 inches in St. Albans, Vermont.  They expected around an inch around Burlington, and they got 1.1 inches.

Finally, the expectation was there'd be three to five inches of fluff by the time you got down to Rutland, and they got 4.2 inches. Way to go, National Weather Service in South Burlington.

Those meteorologists shouldn't rest on their laurels. They have a few days of challenging forecasts to get through, including the risk of a pretty good size snowstorm come Monday.

Before you get all panicky, it's still not clear whether it will even snow Sunday night and Monday, nevermind how much. It is looking likely that some snow will fall, but a lot of things have to come together before we get a big dump.

Before that potential storm hits, it'll stay kind of cold. Today will barely make it to around 20 degrees, despite quite a bit of sunshine. Remember, the sun at the end of February feels a lot nicer than it does in late December so if you have outdoor winter sports plans today, go for it!

It'll be a few degrees either side of zero tonight, and then get vaguely milder Friday, with highs flirting with 30 degrees.

It looks like a small storm will come through Saturday night. Best guess is a lot of us will get one to three inches of snow.

Then comes Sunday night and Monday.  One thing working against the idea of a huge snowstorm is whatever comes up along the coast will be a fast mover. There will be nothing in its way, such as a blocking, cold high pressure system to its north. It'll be a Carol Burnett Show closing song type of storm, you know, "Seems we just get started and before you know it, comes the time we have to say so long."

The bigger question marks is how close this storm comes to the coast. Dependin upon where the storm goes, it could range from a decent statewide snowfall in Vermont to a whiff, with just light snow across southern sections. The computer models on this aren't in agreement yet. Such an argumentative bunch!

Early guesses are southern Vermont will get more than the north, but time will tell. Again, even though we don't know exactly what will happen with this potential storm, it will NOT be anything  like a over-hyped Blizzard Of The Century or whatever.

What's more certain is the winter cold will continue. Temperatures most of next week will be far below normal. Afternoon temperatures during the first week in March are usually in the 30s.

Instead, there will be two or three days next week when highs only reach the upper single numbers and teens.   Clearly, maple sugar makers are going to have to wait longer.

Yet ANOTHER Huge Flood: Atmospheric River Drowning Part Of California

Severe flooding in Guerneville, California today.

It seems we have one record flood after another here in the United States.

We now likely have another bad one

The Russian River in northern California is forecast to reach one of its highest crests on record later this evening. That level would trash, among many other things, the popular resort town of Guerneville.

Even before tonight's expected crest, Gueneville was badly flooded. Live images early this afternoon via ABC 7 in San Francisco shows vast residential and business areas of the town already deep under water.  The video showed the tops of cars barely poking above the muddy water, and water entering many dozens of homes.

The water level at Guerneville this afternoon was well over 40 feet. The expected crest tonight would be 46.1 feet. The record height of the river there is 49.7 feet in 1955. The current flood would be easily the worst in more than two decades.

By this afternoon, Guerneville was an island, with no way to drive in or out of the small city. Most of the area has or will soon be evacuated. The nearby town of Monte Rio is also under water.

Flood warnings are up for most of northern California north of a San Francisco - Yosemite line, at least in the lower and middle elevations.

An atmospheric river focused most of its fire hose intense rain from the Pacific Ocean going inland just north of San Francisco and into north-central and northeastern California.  According to NOAA, atmospheric rivers are long, narrow regions in the atmosphere that resemble rivers in the sky. They transport a lot of water vapor, often from the tropics to coastal areas. These rivers can also continue well inland.

Another view of flooding today in the Guerneville, California area.

When atmospheric rivers hit land, they often unleash torrential rains in a relatively narrow strip. That's just the what happened here. Most of this atmospheric river focused on an area between California's border with Oregon and the San Francisco Bay area.

Guerneville is about 75 miles north of San Francisco and lies near the epicenter of this latest atmospheric river. Reports of eight to 12 inches of rain in two days are common in the area around Guerneville. The town of Venado, in the Russian River basin, got more than 20 inches of rain in those two days.

The rain is lighter now, but the damage is done with such a huge amount of water coming out of the sky.

Flood warnings and mud slide alerts remain in effect for much of northern California, including all areas north of San Francisco, the Sacramento metro area and points north. This includes what's left of the town of Paradise, destroyed by a wildfire late last year.

In the central and northern Sierra Nevada mountains, two to five feet of snow fell with the atmospheric river, on top of already an already very deep snow cover. While lower elevation rains won't be as heavy in the coming days as they were recently, heavy snowfall will persist in the Sierra Nevada.

A 70-mile portion of Interstate 80 through the Sierra Nevada mountains is closed because of the snow, and there's no word on when it will reopen.

The California flooding comes while the south central United States is battling serious flooding from torrential rains last week. Some rivers had record high flood levels. Major flooding is ongoing along the lower Ohio River. Large stretches of the Mississippi River are also flooding.

Obviously, I can't draw a direct line between climate change and all these floods, but the trend is consistent with global warming, most scientists who look at the problem say. Flood are increasing in the United States, partly due to climate change.

Other factors are at work, too. More people are in the way of potential floods. Plus, development which puts concrete, asphalt and other impermeable surfaces over the ground don't allow water to soak in. Instead, the water runs off and makes floods worse than they otherwise would be.

Here's some video. This is what Guerneville looked like from the air today:

So Much Snow That Big Good Boy Had To Dig Path For Small Good Boy

The area around Durango, California just received about 80 inches of snow in about a week, with maybe three feet in just three day.

That's a TON of snow by any measure. People had trouble getting around, and so did their best friends.

Case in point is the video below, in which a small good boy has trouble making it back home through the deep drifts. Luckily a bigger good boy was available to clear a path for the stuck little guy.

Here's the sweetness in the snow:

Winter Hangs Tough, At Least Until Around March 10

A burst of snow adds another dusting of snow to my St. Albans yard
last week. We're on the cusp of March, but winter weather will
last into the new month.  

Friday is the start of meteorological spring, when weather geeks, climatologists and that sort of crowd say the new season begins.

It's arbitrary. Considering the period March 1 to May 31 as spring is a convenient way to compare and constrast current and past seasons. Since records are kept month to month, it makes sense.

Climatologists be damned, don't count on spring weather arriving this Friday, here or in most places in the nation.

A very large blast of Arctic air will be just beginning to enter the nation via the northwestern Great Plains on Friday. This great gush of frigid air will engulf most of the nation east of the Rockies, except maybe Florida.

Granted, this Arctic outbreak will be far from the Worst Ever. It will be the kind of cold wave that often occurs in early March. There might be some daily record low temperatures broken in the northern Plains and perhaps a few other places, but it's not coming close to be historic.

Here in Vermont, the Arctic air won't have arrived yet by Friday, so the optimists among us might feel a subtle taste of spring as temperatures rise into the seasonable upper 20s and low 30s. That won't last.

Before we get to Friday we've got enough winter weather to get through. A small storm is scooting by to our south, and it's about to snow in much of Vermont. You'll notice as of mid-morning today that the overcast is lowering and thickening.

It'll start this afternoon. By tomorrow new snow accumulation in Vermont will be modest: It looks like it will be a dusting to an inch north of Route 2; about 1 to 3 inches between Route 2 and Route 4, and three to five inches south of Route 4.

January-like cold will hang on into Thursday. It'll be in the single numbers above or below zero tonight and tomorrow night, and in the upper teens and low 20s Thursday.

Things get murky with the forecast going into the weekend. Storminess seems likely, but how it will shake it out is not easy to tease out. There seems like there will be some snow, possibly mixed with a little rain Saturday afternoon and night. It's too soon to talk accumulation.

There's even more question marks come later Sunday and Monday. There's some indications there could be a pretty good snowstorm, but the forecast models are all over the place with this. Some say a lot of snow, some say a little, some say nothing.

So, here in Vermont, right now the best I can do is say between Sunday and Monday we'll get between a trace and two feet of snow. That's worthless, right?

That Arctic air that I talked about will flood into Vermont Sunday or Monday and stay around for a good part of next week. The cold won't be as intense as it will be in the northern Plains. The sun angle is higher now than it was in December and January, so the air will modify under that sun on its trip to the Northeast.

Still, it will be colder than normal by both March and January standards.

There are preliminary signs that things might move toward spring in much of the nation around March 10 or so. The flow of Arctic air look like it wants to get largely cut off after that date. There's no guarantees on this, and it's hard to tell how warm it will get. It is reason for hope, though.

Meteorological spring or not, milder weather is inevitable as we move through March, so the chances of welcome thaws are going to increase, whether or not the weather pattern cooperates or not.

Signs point to continued storminess well into March, so things could be a pretty wild wide through much of the month.

All The Stupid Complaints About Meterologists In One Handy Video

This dude plays the archetypal dumb cluck who says all
the dumbest things to meteorologists in a worthwhile video.

I'm not a meteorologist. Just a weather geek. I definitely have training in meteorology, but didn't go the full distance to get a degree in it.

I'm not super great at more advanced math, which a meteorology degree requires, so I went with a journalism degree.

Basically, that means I'm not smart enough to be a full-blown meteorologist, pardon the punny weather reference there.

Meteorologists are really, really smart. However, arguably more than any other profession, they have to put up with an awful lot of outspoken stupidity raining down on them. (There I go again.)

Not all meteorologists are on TV, but they are the ones who constantly get harassed about their wardrobe. As if that aspect of a weather person is the most important. Female meteorologists seem to be most targeted here.   As if the most important thing about a televised tornado warning is the color dress the person delivering said warning is wearing.

Speaking of which, people always complain when regular programming is interrupted by a tornado or some other severe weather warning. The warning might not be for a location close to you, so you scream that the warning interrupted a critical moment of "Wheel Of Fortune."

You really don't care if the TV meteorologist is trying to save lives eight counties over. "Wheel Of Fortune" is so much more important, right?

Then the meteorologists get dinged for a slightly inaccurate forecast, or the forecast is accurate but people don't understand what a 30 percent chance of showers means. Crackpot tinfoil hat-wearing onspiracy theorists are angry because meteorologists know chemtrails are bullshit fiction. People would rather believe some Russian bot on the internet than a real, live scientist, I guess.

Anyway, rant over. This rant will continue in this entertaining and what meteorologists would say is a way-too-familiar scenario in this video:

Big Storminess Of Past Week Kinda, Sorta Calming Down In U.S, Including Here In Vermont

A mother and her four year old kid managed to
survive this tree falling on their car during
high winds yesterday in Milton, Massachusetts.

Well, that was quite the windy day here in Vermont, wasn't it.

As advertised, things weren't quite as bad in the Green Mountain State as elsewhere, but it was impressive. Damage was widely scattered but noticeable: A couple barns lost their roofs, trees and branches fell everywhere, including on a few houses.

Power was out for thousands across Vermont yesterday, but most of us have their juice back. There were just a few outages left here and there as of 8:30 a.m. today, mostly in Bennington County, where winds were arguably the strongest in the state on Monday.

Most low elevations in Vermont had peak gusts in the 45 to 55 mph range, but this storm was really something in the mountains here in Vermont and in the rest of the Northeast.

It's always windier - especially during storms - in the mountains, but this was really something.  Thank goodness these screaming winds above 3,500 feet or so in elevation had some trouble mixing down to the valleys.

Whiteface Mountain, New York had a gust of 107 mph. A large communications tower on Sugarloaf Mountain in Maine collapsed in 100 mph gusts. The top of Mount Washington reached 171 mph, the strongest wind on record for February on the New Hampshire peak.

Back here in Vermont, the top of Mount Mansfield reached 124 mph, which I think might be some sort of record, I'm not sure.

It's still windy today, but not nearly as bad. There won't be any more wind damage, but the gusts will keep us feeling cold. Temperatures will only make it into the teens this afternoon, and with wind gusts as high as 30 mph, wind chills will certainly be below zero.

The weather here in Vermont and most of the rest of the nation will not be as dramatic over the next week as it has in the past week, but there's still plenty of action to talk about.

If you were looking for an early spring this year, it ain't happening. A guess that stupid rodent in Pennsylvania was wrong back on February 2.

High winds, drifting snow, and blowing snow obscured the landscape
in Kassan, Minnesota over the weekend, trapping cars. Persistent
cold and record amounts of February snow in that region are
raising fears of flooding later in the spring. 

The weather pattern favors below normal temperatures for almost all of the nation through about March 10. Many areas after that date will stay cold.

The epicenter of the cold is going to stay where it has all month -- in the northeastern Rockies and northern Plains. There will be quite a few cities and towns there that will end up having their coldest February on record.

Some examples: Cut Bank, Montana, near the Canadian border, is running an incredible 28 degrees below normal so far this month, and the intense cold there will continue through the first week of March. Cut Bank has had 16 days this month where the temperature stayed below zero all day, and only two days this month failed to get below zero.

Yeah, I'm complaining about the cold in Vermont, but I've got nothing on Cut Bank.

In addition to the intense cold, the Dakotas, Minnesota, Iowa and Wisconsin have had record or near record amounts of snow in February. With forecasts of a delayed start to the melt season,  there's fears the weather will turn to spring all at once later on, causing an abrupt melt and severe flooding.

People in this region are already whispering about 1997, when a massive flood after a snowy winter and a late spring unleashed a devastating inundation of Grand Forks, North Dakota.

Back here in Vermont, it will be cold, but not to the extreme of the northern Plains. After a couple days that will be about 20 degrees colder than normal, we'll briefly warm up to something close to normal by Friday and Saturday. Then it will get cold again, probably until at least around March 10.

Things could change of course, but right now I'm not seeing any really big storms in the next week or so. Yes, there will be a little snow in southern Vermont Wednesday or Wednesday night, and maybe a little snow, rain or a mix Saturday. But unless things shift dramatically, forecasters see not big dumps of snow or torrential rains or super wind storms for now.

High Winds Rake Great Lakes, Northeast, Will Still Hit Us In Vermont

High winds pushed his immense pile of ice onshore
from Lake Erie Sunday. Photo via Twitter from
Erie County ESU 

As of 6 a.m. this morning, the wind that we anticipated in Vermont really wasn't  bad at all. They were gusting into the 25 to 30 mph, which is something we see all the time.

However, the strong, gusty winds are still coming. They've just been delayed a bit

Behind the cold front that came through last night, a very subtle, barely noticeable and transient little bubble of higher pressure temporarily kept the winds at bay.  That's little weather feature is passing by to our east.

With that gone and daylight bringing better atmospheric mixing, it will get windier during the day.

By atmospheric mixing, what I mean is stronger winds aloft will be better able to sneak down to the Earth's surface at times during the day, leading to stronger wind gusts down where we live.

In fact, as we got past dawn in St. Albans, Vermont, the wind began to pick up noticeably. Winds have started to increase elsewhere in the Green Mountain State as well.

The wind in Vermont today won't be as bad as they were in places like western New York and southern Ontario, where gusts exceeded 70 mph and caused a lot of damage. (More on that in a moment, including some wild, wild video.)

Still, most of the Green Mountain State will see gusts to around 50 mph today. In some open areas, and in some spots along the eastern slopes of the Green Mountains, winds could reach 60 mph.

Ice shove from Lake Erie threatening shoreline homes in
Hamburg, New York Sunday. 

Since these strong winds will persist all day and overnight, that gives ample opportunity for tree limbs and power lines to snap. This probably won't rival the big wind storm of October, 2017, but I'm sure there will be issues with the electricity being out in many parts of the state from time to time.

Even though Vermont's winds won't be as bad as some other places in the Northeast and the Great Lakes, I'd keep the phone charged and the flashlights handy, because you could still lose power today.

The strongest winds will skirt most of Vermont, heading across central New York, and screaming through southern New England and parts of New Hampshire and Maine. There, gusts will go as high as 65 mph.

There's a couple other factors to consider with this windstorm. A little snow fell overnight. I received about a half inch here in St. Albans. Higher elevations got two to four inches. The snow showers wil persist today, especially in mid and high elevations. The snow will be powdery and blow around a lot.

Even though we're not talking about much snow, the strong winds will blow it around, creating areas of white outs in exposed areas along roads and highways.

The other factor is wind chill. It wasn't that cold early this morning, with temperatures in the 20s. But readings will fall all day and into tonight. The strong winds tonight will create some pretty nasty wind chill as actual temperatures sink to near zero.

That state of affairs will continue Tuesday. The wind won't be as bad - only gusting to 30 or 35 mph. But temperatures will struggle to reach the low teens at best during the afternoon, so wind chills will stay in the teens to near 20 below zero. Brrrr!

We'll finally calm down Wednesday but stay very cold - definitely more like mid-January than the cusp of March. Things will temporarily turn somewhat milder by the weekend, but by then, another storm will come in.

At this point, it's looking like another round of mixed precipitation and wind. But computer models wildly disagree on the strength and path of the potential storm. Could be weak, could be relatively strong.  This forecast will get a fine tuning later in the week.

WILD WINDS ELSEWHERE IN THE NATION

Web cam image from near Kassan, Minnesota on Sunday shows
what strong winds and snow can do to a highway.

Vermont has been relatively calm with this storm so far, but that's not true elsewhere.

Power outages are a good measure: Only 500 or so outages were reported in Vermont at 8:30 this morning, before the wind really started gaining strength.

By contrast, more than 600,000 homes and businesses in the Great Lakes and Northeast were without electricity this morning.

Probably the most spectacular effects of this storm has been the ice shove along Lake Erie. Southwest winds gusted to near 75 mph over that lake, which before the storm was mostly covered with fragmented ice.

The wind shoved that ice toward the shore in western New York and southern Ontario. A boom had been across the mouth of the Niagara River, which was meant to keep the ice from blasting upstream. But the boom was no match for these crushing winds, and the ice chunks came rushing in.

The result was these sudden piles of ice that in some places were at least the height of a two story building, if not higher. There's an incredible video of this whole thing starting at the bottom of this post. It's quite a scene!

Similar ice shoves, as they're called, prompted evacuations on lakeshore communities like Hamburg, near Buffalo.

All that ice jamming the Niagara River also blocked the flow of water, causing a weird flash flood - one that was created without heavy rain, but an ice shove.

Further north, there wasn't as much ice on Lake Ontario, so ice shoves weren't as big a problem. But the open water created lake effect snows. That combined with gusts well over 60 mph, is creating a blizzard on the New York shores of Lake Ontario.

High winds gusting to near 80 mph in spots caused lots of tree damage and some structural damage in southern Ontario. A blizzard struck areas west and north of Toronto.

In the Midwestern United States, blizzards struck Iowa, Minnesota and surrounding areas as winds gusted past 50 mph. Many highways were closed due to zero visibility, and a number of motorists had to be rescued.

Here's the video of the ice shove along the Niagara River:



Another video showing the force, speed and danger of this ice shove along the Niagara:



News video showing wind damage around Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania:

Tucson, Arizona Police Investigate A Mysterious White Powder

In the video below, the hard-working police force in Tucson, Arizona have been scrutinizing a strange white powder that appeared in the area this past week. Locals hadn't seen anything like this before.

The Tucson area doesn't generally see things like this, so the crime lab got involved, and police helpfully held a "press conference" to update the media on their investigation. Flake news, anyone?

Here is the video of the Tucson police at work a few days ago, which reveals the outcome of the investigation:

Wide Ranging Storm Is Cuttng Power From Plains To Northeast

Tornado in Burnsville, Misssissippi Saturday

As expected, it's incredibly windy in some parts of the nation due to an intense storm in the Great Lakes this Sunday morning. Where it isn't windy in the Northeast, it will soon get that way.

Given the huge area this storm is affecting, I'm actually wondering if this will be a billion dollar storm, one that causes at least $1 billion in damage. That amount of damage is a hallmark of a bad storm, for sure.

If this happens, it won't be because there's particularly intense damage in one region. There is pockets of extensive damage in the Mid-South, where flooding has forced a number of people from their houses.

Many roads are still closed, and not every river has crested yet. A landslide in Chattanooga, Tennessee flattened a Subway restaurant, but nobody was hurt. Another Tennessee landslide earlier this week killed a person.

There is also spots with serious damage in the Deep South from Saturday's tornadoes and severe thunderstorms. Mississippi was hit especially hard. Unfortunately, we've had our first tornado death of the year.  A woman in hard-hit  Columbus, Mississippi died when a roof of the building she was in collapsed during the tornado.

Only ten tornado deaths were recorded in the United States during 2018, the lowest number on record. I'm obviously hoping the Mississippi death Saturday is not the beginning of a trend reversal. The peak of the tornado season, after all, doesn't hit until the period April through June.

The threat of more tornadoes with this storm is over. However, there's a huge area of real estate that will have relatively light wind damage - trees and power lines down, some trees down on houses, a few barns unroofed, shingles and siding off homes and businesses - that kind of thing.

I don't remember the last time I've seen such a vast area covered by high wind warnings. The warnings this morning stretched from Wisconsin to New England and south as far as North Carolina.

Most of this area is of course heavily populated. When you add up all the scattered wind damage, that will be a lot of insurance claims.

The power failures will be extensive, too, considering the millions of people who live in the high wind zone. It will be interesting to see by tonight and Monday morning just how many people lose electricity.

VERMONT IMPACTS

Gas station in Illinois damaged by high winds
this weekend. Those strong winds
are heading east, and will affect
the Midwest and Northeast through
Monday 

As expected, there was, and is, mixed precipitation all around the state. It hasn't been particularly heavy, but was certainly enough to screw up the roads. My St. Albans, Vermont driveway, for instance, was a sheet of ice this morning.
]
The salt shakers are out, and temperatures were rising above freezing by mid-morning in many areas. By this afternoon, most if not all of Vermont will be above freezing, with scattered light rain showers.

The big story with this storm in Vermont continues to be the wind. There hasn't been many gusts yet but that will change soon.

The first wave of wind won't be the most widespread. While most of the state will be pretty gusty this afternoon, the real blustery zone will be along the western slopes of the Green Mountains as winds come from the southeast.

Gusts along the western slopes will be as high as 55 mph in some spots, enough for a few power failures here and there.

The big storm's cold front will come through this evening, probably with a band of showers. There's even a slight chance of a rumble of thunder with that line of showers. After the front goes by, winds regionwide will really ramp up overnight and continue Monday.  Most of us will have gusts near 50 mph. 

Gusts will approach or even exceed 60 mph in the Adironacks of New York, perhaps the open areas near Lake Champlain in Vermont, and in some of the eastern slopes of the Green Mountains.

As temperatures fall, snow showers will break out and continue into Monday. Accumulations will be minor, with a dusting to as much as three inches in the valleys and two to six inches in the mountains. But with all this wind, even that little bit of snow will blow around an awful lot, making for occasional local white outs on the roads.

Winds will finally die down by Tuesday, but it will be awfully cold for late February, with highs Tuesday and Wednesday 5 to 15 above and lows at least a little below zero.

It's kind of beginning to look like another rinse and repeat of this kind of storm next weekend, but I don't think the winds will be as strong as the one we're contending with today and tomorrow.

Very Windy, Icy Storm Poised To Hit Vermont; Will Be Much Worse Elsewhere In Nation

An extremey colorful National Weather Service map today means
there are lots and lots of weather hazards going on around
the United States today. 

It's going to be a nice, calm, pleasant enough Saturday here in Vermont, with peeks of sun and mild afternoon temperatures in the 30s.

Don't get used to it. As the National Weather Service in South Burlington says in their Saturday morning forecast discussion: "Better enjoy today because tomorrow is going to get ugly."

Ugly, yes, unless you enjoy mixed precipitation, a cold rain, and especially strong gusty winds. If you love all of those weather hazards, Sunday will be your day.

At least it isn't as bad as much of the rest of the nation. Today and tomorrow will feature blizzards, tornadoes, severe flooding and winds even stronger than we'll get there. I'll talk more about local impacts here in Vermont, first, then get into the mess elsewhere in the nation:

VERMONT AREA EFFECTS

Late tonight, snow, sleet and freezing rain will break out across the area as the storm's warm front moves into the region. Yeah, we've been through this drill plenty of times this winter. Precipitation won't be particularly heavy, but it will be enough to ice up the roads across Vermont late tonight and Sunday morning.

That's why there's a winter weather advisory for all of us, ending at 9 a.m. in the Champlain Valley and noon further east in the state. By afternoon, things will have transitioned to a cold rain.

The real story for us with this storm is strong winds. I'm sure there will be problems with downed trees and power lines. Initially, on Sunday, there will be a period of wind gusts up to 50 mph along the western slopes of the Green Mountains and up to 45 mph in the Champlain Valley.

Sunday evening, the powerful storm's cold front will come through, and behind that is where the winds really ramp up.

There is a high wind watch for the Adirondacks of New York Sunday afternoon into Monday. A high wind watch in southern Vermont starts Sunday night and goes into Monday.  I expect these watches to be upgraded to warnings later.

I'm pretty sure the National Weather Service in South Burlington will issue a wind advisory, if not a high wind watch or warning, for the rest of Vermont Sunday night and Monday.

Areas under the high wind watches could see gusts to 60 mph Sunday night and Monday. Elsewhere in Vermont, gusts will go to 50 mph or higher. Sunday and Monday won't be be the right time to wear your new hat or show off your new hairdo outdoors.

Rain will change to snow showers Sunday night and continue on Monday, especially in mountains. Monday will be a harsh day, with those strong, possibly damaging winds, falling temperatures, along with some snow and blowing snow.

It'll turn very cold for late February by Tuesday, with highs barely in the teens and lows around 0. Some moderation will come later in the week, but it will be chillier than normal. It's not spring yet!

TROUBLE ACROSS U.S.

Especially in areas shaded in red and orange, there is a risk of
tornadoes today. A few of the tornadoes could be strong
and long lasting. 

Most of the United States is feeling effects of this very large storm, but if I had to pick a place that's having the worst time with this, I'd say northern Mississippi.

Days of torrential rain there and in nearby Tennessee and Alabama have caused a lot of flooding, and the torrential rain continues today.

An example, it sure is wet in Tupelo, honey. In the four days ending at midnight last night, the northern Mississippi city had collected 10.73 inches of rain. Another inch or so fell in the four hours after midnight, and more heavy rain will come down today.

Some rivers in this region are or will experience record flooding from these massive downpours.

Even worse, there is going to be an outbreak of severe weather today. The best chance of tornadoes, some of them possibly long lasting and strong, is in,  yes, northern Mississippi.  

This tornado threat also includes much of Tennessee, eastern Arkansas and northern Alabama

I'm impressed by the wide area of high winds this strong storm will cover. A wide path from Texas to New England is under high wind watches and warnings, or wind advisories.

While wind damage will occur in all these areas, it still looks like the epicenter will be in the eastern Great Lakes. The Buffalo, New York area is still expecting gusts Sunday of up to 75 mph. Worse, a huge amount of already fragmented ice on Lake Erie will be shoved onshore in and near Buffalo, which would cause a lot of damage. I guess this is yet another reason to dislike Buffalo in the winter.

Finally, a wide area in the central part of the country is under a blizzard warning.  You get that when it snows, and winds gust to 55 mph. This storm will be especially bad further north in Iowa and Minnesota. There's already a lot of snow on the ground from previous storms, and these strong winds will pick up and blow that around. I imagine there will be some pretty gigantic snow drifts.

Overall, I'd rate this storm the worst of the winter for the nation as a whole.

That Big Storm For This Weekend Is Already Creating Wild Weather

A person enjoys a rare, but not unheard of snow flurry in Pasadena,
California Thursday. Image from LAist. 

The big storm slated to affect much of the nation through Monday is already creating some pretty extreme weather.

That trend will continue for a couple days at least.

The storm is still battering the southwestern United States with snow, wind and flooding.

Flagstaff, Arizona on Thursday had its biggest snowstorm on record, with 35.9 inches. This city sits at an elevation of around 7,000 feet in northern Arizona, so snow is common there. But not like this.

The old record for biggest snowstorm in Flagstaff was 31 inches in December, 2015, says Accuweather.

Elsewhere, there were some unusual snow flurries around the Los Angeles area, but the snow wasn't quite as unprecedented as some media outlets let on. Flurries were seen in somewhat higher elevations of Malibu, Pasadena, West Hollywood and Calabasas. Some of those areas hadn't seen snow in years, or even a couple decades, so the flakes drew countless people out to gawk.

But it didn't snow in downtown Los Angeles and it hasn't done so since 1962.

Meanwhile, the normally dry Phoenix, Arizona area was under a flood warning this morning after the storm dumped a heavy, cold rain there.

The storm this morning was reorganizing over northeastern New Mexico and wil head northeast across the Plains into the Great Lakes area.

Given the extremes this storm has already produced and the favorable dynamics for it to strengthen, this system is sure to cause a lot more problems before it heads into Canada later Sunday into Monday.

The first problem is flooding. NOAA's Weather Prediction Center has declared a high risk of flooding today in parts of Tennessee and northern Mississppi and Alabama. A high risk is designated only a few times a year across the country.

Past experience shows areas that when a high risk of a flood is forecast, the subsequent result is at least one flood related death about 50 percent of the time and at least $1 million in damage 70 percent of the time.

This area of the nation is at a serious risk of flooding today, and
it has already started. The area in pink is in
especially deep trouble. 

Considering that a lot of flooding is already going on in this area, I'd say damage already well exceeds $1 million.  It was raining hard in the risk zone this morning and several rounds of downpours are forecast today and Saturday.

Severe weather and possible tornadoes are in the forecast for this same region Saturday. The good news is NOAA's Storm Prediction Center has backed off a little on the how big an area will be affected by the storm threat.

A huge swath of the Plains from Kansas to Wisconsin and Michigan are expected a snowstorm out of this with high winds. Some areas will have blizzard and white out conditions.

The storm is gathering in such a way that western New York is under the gun for some very serious winds. The National Weather Service in Buffalo said winds there could gust to 75 mph on Sunday. That's strong enough to topple trees and power lines, and worse, cause some structural damage.

The wind will be strong enough to shove ice from lakes Erie and Ontario onto shore, which would also cause a lot of damage. There's also a real risk of damaging winds Sunday in Ohio and Pennsylvania.

VERMONT IMPACTS

Although there isn't all that much snow on the ground around my
house in St. Albans, Vermont - about nine inches, the snow piles
are getting big. The snow on the ground keeps getting cut back
by thaws, but the snow piles melt more slowly, then keep
building up in subsequent snowfalls

The forecast for this storm hasn't changed much since yesterday. Mixed precipitation will break out Saturday night across Vermont. Accumulations will be minor, with one to three inches of snow and sleet away from Lake Champlain.

Freezing rain could easily linger well into Sunday morning east of the Green Mountains, so travel will be an issue then. 

We'll get a lot of wind too, especially Sunday night and Monday. I have a feeling we'll at least be under a wind advisory by then. This won't be as bad as it will be out toward Buffalo, but we could still be dealing with some downed trees and power lines.

After a thaw Sunday and early Sunday night, it will turn colder again. Snow showers will fly around in the wind Monday, but they won't amount to much. There could be a few inches in the mountains.

We'll have a long spell of mostly colder than normal weather from Tuesday on through the first week of March, at least.  There will be spells of snow during this period, too. It's hard to tease out this far in advance whether any of that snow will be big dumps or little squirts of snow.

Right now, I'm thinking little squirts, but that of course could change. Don't hold me to it.

Here's One Way To Travel Across A Lake In The Winter

A guy in Maine wanted to get across a frozen lake.

It didn't take much effort. He just opened an umbrella, and let the wind propel him across the slippery ice on the frozen lake. The man in the video claims he traveled three miles this way.

Looks fun. Watch:

Major Storm To Cause Havoc In Much Of Nation Now Through Monday

Schematic from the National Weather Service of
what the large storm will look like on
waeather maps on Sunday. 

A real humdinger of a storm is widely expected to cross the nation starting now and ending in the Northeast Monday, causing practically every imaginable weather hazard.

It will become an intense storm by the time it reaches the middle of the country.

It is the first storm of the season that will have at least some characteristics of a spring season storm. But ironically, it will introduce what will probably be the last truly serious and rather long lasting winter cold outbreaks.

This storm will certainly have some impacts to pay attention to here in Vermont, but at least those effects won't be as serious as those in some other parts of that nation. I'll get into that a little further down in this post.  

ALREADY STARTING

The storm is just starting to get its act together in the Southwest and it's already making an impact. It snowed in Las Vegas overnight, the second time this week that's happened. Snow is not unheard of in Sin City, but it is relatively rare.

Last night in Las Vegas

The official half inch of snow that fell in the past 24 hours is the first measurable snow there in a little over ten years.

Parts of the Las Vegas metro area that sit a little higher in elevation got up to six inches of accumulation. As of this morning, it was still snowing around that region.

Northern Arizona, where snow is more common than in Las Vegas, is getting blasted. Much of that region, including the city of Flagstaff, can expected around two feet of snow. It was really coming down in Flagstaff this morning, so that forecast seems accurate.

The mountains of northern Arizona could end up with at least three feet of new powder out of this.

The storm will spread a swath of pretty heavy snow, with areas of strong winds and blowing snow into the central and northern Plains, and western Great Lakes over the next few days. Some of these areas have already seen record amounts of snow this February, and this will just add to the total.

FLOODING

Flooding is going to be a big time concern over a good chunk of the Southeast and in the Tennessee and Ohio River Valleys. Actually, the flooding is nasty in this region even before the weekend storm arrives.

Storms all week have dumped several inches of rain on most of this area, and flooding is ongoing. Another three to five inches of rain is expected today through Saturday in the hardest hit areas of Tennessee, Mississippi, Alabama and surrounding areas, so this will only make a bad situation worse. You'll continue to see the flooding on your news feeds for the rest of the week, I'm sure.

SEVERE WEATHER

Areas in yellow and especially orange can expect severe thunderstorms
and perhaps tornadoes on Saturday.

Warm, humid air has been streaming into the Southeast for the past few days. As this big storm enters the middle of the nation, it will only increase this wet, hot flow.

The approach of the storm's cold front, and the veering winds aloft associated with the storm are a good recipe for a burst of severe weather, which could include a number of tornadoes.

As The Weather Channel notes, the last day the nation had at least 100 reports of severe weather - bad, windy thunderstorms, tornadoes and big hail, was on November 30. Saturday seems destined to break that slow trend.

Widespread severe weather outbreaks are relatively rare in the winter, but they do happen. Once you start getting into late February, as in now, the chances of severe weather and tornadoes begins to ramp up, especially in the Gulf Coast states

So this potentially destructive initial sign of spring is right on schedule. The difference this time is the severe weather looks to cover more real estate than a typical February thunderstorm and tornado outbreak.

The severe storms and tornado risk will encompass the northern Gulf Coast states and the Tennessee and lower Ohio River valleys, which is a bit far north for a tornado outbreak this time of year. Note that the greatest risk for tornadoes is in the same spot as the highest flood risk. It's going to be a long three days or so in the Mid-South.

HIGH WINDS

Outside the severe weather zone, damaging wind will still be a problem. By the time the storm reaches the Great Lakes Sunday, it will be very powerful, and very large. This means high winds are likely from the northern Plains to New England to parts of the Southeast.

While I seriously doubt anyone will have the highest winds ever,  the large area included in the windy zone means power outages will be felt in at least a quarter of the nation. If you have stock in electrical line repair crew companies, you're in luck.

At this point, western New York looks like it might receive the worst of the wind. The National Weather Service in Buffalo is already saying that if things turn out the way they think they will on Sunday, there will be at least 12 hours of wind gusts in the 60 t0 70 mph range, which would of course cause a lot of damage.

PATTERN CHANGE

Often, when there's a particularly intense storm like the one forecast this weekend, it helps trigger an overall weather pattern change.  This looks to be the case here.

Weather outlook into early March looks cold, as all the blue
in this eight to fourteen day outlook indicates

Cold air has been bottled up all month in the western half of the nation, but it's beginning to look like this frigid air will expand.

In the closing days of February and especially the first few days of March, it's beginning to look like frigid air will envelop the northern half of the nation from Montana to New England. 

HERE IN VERMONT

As I mentioned above, this storm will certainly affect us here in Vermont. Of course, the forecast could change, but here's what it looks like at the moment:

After lingering light mixed precipitation today, it'll be dry and relatively mild Friday and Saturday. Then the action starts. Since this powerful storm is moving by to our west, we'll have a rinse and repeat of the recent pattern.

Saturday night, a little snow will come down, then transition to sleet and freezing rain, then rain by Sunday morning. It'll turn mild on Sunday as some rain continues.

There might be a few issues with ice jams in the rivers shifting around, so there could be some localized flooding. But the rain won't be heavy enough, the warmth won't be strong enough or long-lasting enough to create widespread high water. So that's good.

As the storm's cold front passes Sunday night, it will get colder with snow showers that will continue into Monday.

The big story looks like it will be the wind. It'll start with strong southerly winds, especially in the Champlain Valley and in the higher terrain late Saturday night and Sunday.

Sunday night and Monday, it will be windy from the west and northwest regionwide. It's a little soon to know precisely how windy it will get, but I wouldn't be surprised if it's gusty enough to bring down at least a few branches and power lines.

It's looking like it will get colder and colder after the storm. March seems like it wants to come in like the proverbial lion, with possibly subzero cold, bouts of gusty winds and wind chills, and maybe some periods of snow.

Wicked Fast Jet Stream Meant Speedy Cross Country Flights

A schematic of the force of Tuesday's jet stream winds in the
United States from CBS News. The whitish shading over
the Northeast depicts record strong jet stream winds
of more than 200 mph.

Like everybody else, I don't like flight delays.

But I understand that weather, mechanical issues, staffing, coordination between airports and all kinds of other factors frequently conspire from letting you make your connecting flight on time.

Every once in awhile, you get lucky and your plane lands a little ahead of schedule. That happened a lot this week as what could be a record fast jet stream rocketed roughly west to east across the nation this week.

Eastbound flights got caught up in this jet stream and often made it to their destination in record time.

For instance, a Virgin Atlantic flight from Los Angeles to London landed at Heathrow 48 minutes early because of the boost given by the jet stream over the United States.

That plane was clocked at going 801 mph over Pennsylvania. Usually, cruising speed is around 560 mph. That 801 mph is faster than the speed of sound and airliners are generally not designed to go that fast. But nothing bad happened because the aircraft was being propelled by 200 mph jet stream winds and not by revved up plane engines.

That meant the air speed of the plane was 800 mph, but the ground speed - what the plane's engines could produce - was well below that.

In any event, most flights heading west to east across the nation in the past couple of day landed earlier than normal. Of course, planes heading in the opposite direction were a little late, because they either had to fight the jet stream head winds or detour around the jet stream.

Jet streams thrive on the contrast between the warm tropics and the cold Arctic. Because there's a bigger temperature contrast between the North Pole and the Equator in the winter, the jet stream is fastest in the winter.

The jet stream got an added boost this week because of a conspiracy of three different branches of the jet stream. A very fast stream coming across the Pacific zoomed into Mexico and the southwestern United States.

Meanwhile, the polar jet stream split, with one arm heading southeastward through the western states, then turning northeastward toward New England. The other branch of the polar jet stream made a beeline from Alaska to the Great Lakes.

All three of these jet stream branches merged over the northeastern United States. They combined their collective power and voila! A record fast jet stream was born over places like Pennsylvania.

The jet stream is 35,000 feet or so overhead. The incredibly fast winds of a jet stream don't usually translate to the surface and that's what happened this time.

Tuesday afternoon, the jet stream was screaming above our heads in Vermont at roughly 200 mph. Here on the ground, it was a delightfully sunny, calm winter day with wind speeds of less than 10 mph.

Jet streams do help steer weather systems. The southern jet stream is carrying moisture from the tropical Pacific, which helps explain why it has been snowing so hard in the Sierra Nevada mountains of California, and raining so hard in the Ohio and Tennessee River valleys this week.

The northern stream that approaches from the west is helping shunt the deeper moisture to our south, which explains why the precipitation with these storms has generally not been that heavy here in Vermont.

The jet stream has slowed down a bit overhead since yesterday but it is still wicked fast. The overall speed and orientation of it is expected to remain roughly the same as it has been the past couple of days, so the current general weather pattern will last that long, too.

Yay! Two Mixed Ugly Storms Coming To Vermont, But It's Much Worse Elsewhere

A sparkling clear winter day in St. Albans, Vermont yesterday. It was an
interlude between the storminess we've had all winter. Another
mixed precipitation mess, albeit relatively minor,
is due tonight across the state. 

The sparkling sunshine that graced Vermont yesterday is gone, replaced by  veil of high thin clouds.

Those clouds signal the next storm system, which will, of course, bring us more mixed precipitation overnight and tomorrow morning. That's been the pattern this winter, and we might as well close out the season with such weather as well.

By the way, another mixed storm seems likely by Sunday.

First, we'll get through tonight. This one won't be huge. It will be just another winter inconvenience. We've had lots of those.

Interestingly, it's worse to our south, and will be somewhat worse than what we're getting once it gets past us and heads toward Maine.

As has been the case often this winter, a storm is headed up into the Great Lakes by tomorrow. It's pushing a warm front towards us. This warm front is lifting mild air up and over the chillier air that is grudgingly moving away toward the northeast.

When this happens, snow usually breaks out and that's exactly what will happen overnight. The National Weather Service tells us to expect one to three inches in western Vermont and three to fie in most locations east of the Green Mountains.

There is a winter weather advisory for the eastern half of Vermont based on this forecast.

While most of this modest storm will come as snow, it will go over to sleet toward the end early tomorrow morning. There could be areas of freezing rain, too, but it won't last long in any one place and won't accumulate too much.

Just be prepared for some slippery travel for the Thursday morning commute, especially from the Green Mountains eastward.  By afternoon at the latest, it will be all over, except for a few lingering rain showers here and there. It will be mild, with temperatures hitting 40 degrees or so in the valleys.

Bottom line: This will be another inconvenient storm in the Green Mountain State, but certainly not Storm Of The Century.

IT'S WORSE ELSEWHERE

When the map on the National Weather Service home page has
lots of pretty colors, you know there's lots of storminess
across the nation. That is indeed the case today, as
the current map indicates.

This is a sprawling storm, and its impacts are much greater elsewhere than they will be here in Vermont.

Ihe Mid-Atlantic States, the storm has a better moisture supply than it will have up here in the north. Winter storm warnings are in effect for western Virginia, much of Maryland and southern Pennsylvania for four to eight inches of snow, followed by sleet and freezing rain today and tonight.

It has already been snowing and sleeting heavily in this area over the course of the morning. Federal offices in Washington, DC are shut down.

That snow will be heavy and wet. Plus, up to a quarter inch of ice is possible in some areas in the Mid-Atlantic. On top of the difficult travel

Further west, in the colder air the storm is throwing heavy snow into parts of Minnesota, Wisconsin and Iowa. Many areas in this region can expect six to 12 inches of new snow by the time this is over.  

This will probably be the snowiest February on record in Minneapolis. Other cities in the region are also having near-record snows this month.

Further south, the problem is also bad, if not worse. There's extensive flooding to report today in areas such as Tennessee, Mississippi and Kentucky. Nashville, Tennessee had already picked up nine inches of rain so far this month, which is a record for February, and more bouts of off and on heavy rain are forecast there through Saturday.

THE NEXT STORM

A new storm is forecast to gather itself together around northern Texas and then head toward the Great Lakes over the weekend. This one will be arguably the first of the season that has springtime characteristics.

Typically in March and April, storms cross the Plains and head toward the Great Lakes. These storms cause outbreaks of severe weather and tornadoes in the South, blizzardy snowstorms in parts of the Plains, and a mixed bag of conditions here in Vermont.

That's precisely what is forecast with the weekend storm.

In Vermont, we will stay relatively mild  - highs in the 30s lows in the 20s for the most part - Friday and Saturday until the next storm hits.

When this next storm arrives, it will probably begin as mixed precipitation Saturday night or early Sunday. Then temperatures are expected to get quite warm - well into the 40s with some rain Sunday. Then it will turn much colder again with snow showers by early next week.

If you want nice spring weather, you are going to have to wait awhile.

South America Has Also Been Suffering Through Weather Extremes Lately

Forest fire in Chile in a region of the nation that doesn't get too much
of this type of disaster. Photo by Martin Bernetti/AFP/Getty Images

It's still summer in the Southern Hemisphere. I've already told you a lot about the extremely hot and dangerous summer in Australia.

January there, as you recall, was the hottest on record.

Parts of South America, it turns out, have also been having a rough summer.

Earlier this month, the town of Porvenir, Chile, reached 90.5 degrees, reports USA Today and many other media outlets.

This is on the southern tip of South America, and is most southerly 90-degre temperature on record.  Porvenir is a little more than 600 miles from the northern tip of Antarctica, or roughly the distance between Atlanta and Miami.

Record heat elsewhere in Chile and Argentina sparked numerous forest fires. While fires burned in southern Chile, near-record floods hit the Atacama desert in northern Chile, normally the driest spot on Earth.

Santiago, Chile reached 100 degrees for the first time on record. In Argentina, the temperature reached 100 degrees in the city of Perito Morino, an all-time high for that city.

Rio de Janeiro suffered through its hottest January in 97 year. Then, echoing Australia, parts of which had a devastating flood after the torrid and drought-ridden summer, Rio had its own deadly storm on February 6.

The storm produced winds of nearly 70 mph and torrential rains that set off widespread flooding and mudslides that killed six people.

Video showed huge amounts of water crashing through streets in Rio de Janeiro, taking cars, people and lots of other things with it.

This makes me wonder if the Northern Hemisphere will have as sweltering a summer this year as it did in 2018.

Here's footage of the extreme storms in Rio de Janeiro on February 6: