Stupid People Who Drive With Snow On Windshield

The driver of this car caused a collision in Montreal.
Hmm. Wonder why?

One day about a week ago, I was driving along after one of Vermont's frequent bouts with mixed precipitation this winter.

I had been unable to scrape the frozen snow off the roof of my truck before I left home. It was really stuck on there. In hindsight, I probably should have tried harder to get that stuff off the truck roof.

By the time I got to Winooski, the snow and ice had started to melt. I stopped at a light on a downward sloping hill and all that snow and ice came down on the windshield.  It was too much for the windshield wipers to handle.  

So, I did what I thought everyone else would have done: I put on my hazard lights, pulled over to the side of the street, got out of the truck and cleaned all the ice of my windshield, then continued on my way.

Apparently, not everybody does that. For proof, check out two of the videos below, and a third from a person who definitely was from Canada, let me tell ya.

 I have seen lots of people driving around with snow on windshields, back windows, you name it. Clean the damn snow off so you don't crash into me and others, you morons!

 The Weather Channel just featured somebody causing a crash because they had an experience similar to me:  Snow had fallen on their windshield, but in their case, they kept going.

Here's that video. I hope the person who caused the crash feels like a real idiot:



And check out this video from last winter in Toronto:



Now, here's a video of somebody who DID make the effort to remove snow from the windshield.  This was in Vancouver, Canada, and he used a very Canadian way to do the job. Look what he's using to get the snow off the car:

Bad News For All Of Us, Especially Climate Denialists: 2019 2nd Hottest On Record

The year 2019 was the second hottest on record says NOAA.
On this map, shades of red are warmer than average for 2019,
blue is colder than average.  Central North America
was the only real cold spot. 

It was predictable and expected news earlier this month, but it's still alarming:

NOAA's National Centers for Environmental Information just came out with their global assessment for the year 2019.

In case you missed it, 2019 was the world's second hottest year on record.

Here's part of a summary from NCEI:

"For 2019, the average temperature across global land and ocean surfaces was 1.71... degrees above the 20th century average. This was the second highest among all years in the 1880-2019 record and just 0.07 (degrees F.) less than the record value set in 2016.

2019 marks the 43rd consecutive year (since 1977) with global land and ocean temperatures, at least nominally, above the 20th century average.

The five warmest years have occured since 2015; nine of the 10 warmest years have occurred since 2005. The year 1998 is the only 20th century year among the 10 warmest on record.

The annual global land and ocean temperature has increased at an average rate of +0.13F per decade since 1880; however, since 1981, the average rate of increase is more than twice that rate (+0.32F).

For the 21-year span that is considered a reasonable surrogate for pre-industrial conditions (1880-1900), the 2019 global land and ocean temperature waws 2.07F above the average."

I dunno. Do you see a trend here?

Well, a few people don't see this. The year 2019 seemed to be year a lot of the media dubbed as the time people got it. That the world is warming up and it is dangerous. A crisis, really.

However, there's still that lively group that will tell you that the world is not warming up. Or if it is, it's just a temporary, natural cycle. Or, if they do concede warming is happening, it's not a big deal.

The denialists can just drive you crazy if you let them.  Their counterpoint to this latest bit of news on 2019 and climate change and other world warming news is like this:

"Yeah, but South Dakota had one of its coldest years on record in 2019!"  True, but as South Dakota goes, so goes the world? Um.....

If one more idiot tells me that climate change doesn't exist because some Podunk town had a record low temperature, I'm going to scream. You don't want to hear my scream. It's awful.

Still, they persist.

Back in November, felon and one of the most vile, most stupid commentators out there (and that's saying something!) Dinesh D'Souza tweeted this gem:

"Remember nuclear winter? Of course you don't.  That's because it didn't happen. Yet it was all the rage on the Left in the 1980s. A generation from now, no one will recall climate change either, and for the same reason. The apocalypse has become a political racket!"

Can I be Captain Obvious here again?  People feared nuclear winter but it didn't happen because Russia and the United States decided it would be a bad idea to nuke each other into oblivion.   Friggin' idiot!

Social media sure as hell isn't helping. I don't know exactly how large a percentage of the public is in the climate denial camp, but platforms like Facebook, Twitter and YouTube certainly amplify the false voices of this denialism.

I'll offer just one example: On January 16, Time magazine online reported:

"YouTube has been 'actively promoting' videos containing misinformation about climate change, a report released Thursday by campaign group Avaaz claims, despite recent policy changes by the platform intended to drive users away from harmful content and conspiracy theories."

When you go on YouTube, there's an 'Up Next' feature.  You're watching the video you want to watch, which is the first video in the list of videos on the right side of the screen that YouTube's algorithms think you'd want to watch.

According to the Time report:

"'We've found that it's very likely that at least one in five users who search or a term like global warming or climate change could be sent down this type of misinformation rabbit hole,'" says Fadi Quran, a campaigns director at Avaaz, and one of the report's authors. 'Scientists are working so hard to educate people about the existential threat we face and YouTube is allowing bad actors among us the last word on this issue for many people.'"

Previous studies have suggested that the majority of videos related to climate change on YouTube are at odds against what scientists are telling us.

Even with all this, there are islands of optimism , as a piece in  The Guardian points out, 2019 might have been the year that climate denialism might have been defeated. At least partially:

"The global climate strike, Greta Thunberg's meteoric rise to international prominence, as well as several high-profile international conferences and reports - all contributed in putting climate skeptics on the back foot.

"Even Donald Trump, who previously claimed that the climate crisis was a 'hoax' invented by China to hold back American industry has begun to brag  all his administration has done to address it."

Never mind the fact that Trump's bragging, as always, is a fake facade. Trump is rebranding before our eyes, like he always does to suit his needs.  Trump has done pretty much nothing in terms of  climate change at all, and now his position is that climate activitsts and others are just negative people.

Trump notwithstanding, the discussion around climate change is now mostly how to address it, and not whether we should address it. This is a debate we should have had at least a couple decades ago but better late than never, I suppose. I'm glad we've at least reached this point.

That Guardian article/editorial, which is definitely worth reading, summarizes the many different approaches to what we can and should do about climate change.

It boils down to this, according to the Guardian in one of the best basic outlines of where we stand:

"No one seems quite clear what is the ultimate goal of the global fight against the climate crisis. Is it merely to enable constant economic growth in a sustainable way, or is it about imposing limits on humanity's ambitions in pursuit of a more harmonious relationship with nature."

Climate denialist have long said environmentalists' goals are to take freedom and independence and wealth away from you and me.

Will we find sustainable ways to keep something like our current lifestyle going?  Do we need to keep our current lifestyle going? Should we find something more sustainable, but still far from some grim dystopia? How?

I guess it depends on whether some of the great minds of the world find solutions, or at least paths forward, or whether the usual opportunists make things worse.....

This is one hell of a season finale cliff hanger, folks.

Floods, Snow, Stupidity, More: Recent Wild Weather Videos

Aftermath of severe floods and mudslides in Brazil.
See video in this post. 

As I always say, pretty much everybody has a camera in their pocket, so we get all kinds of new perspectives on everything, including extreme weather.

As I do from time to time, I highlight some of these videos of wild weather going on in the world currently.  

The first one is part of a tragedy.  Massive floods and mudslides have hit parts of Brazil, killing at least 50 people. This video is very much reminiscent of the Ellicott City, Maryland flash flood videos of 2016 and 2018 in which people are trapped in a restaurant as a torrent sweeps cars and pretty much everything else away through the downtown.

This one is in the city of Belo Horizonte, Brazil:


Here's a flash flood hitting Narok, Kenya this past week. Would you cross this bridge in this weather?



St. John's Newfoundland has largely recovered from that massive blizzard earlier this month, but as you can imagine, there's still LOTS of snow on the ground.

Let's take a trip to the St. John's Costco, via this web cam video to pick up supplies. The middle segment of the video is something. Like driving at the bottom of a canyon:



The opposite end of Canada has gotten an oddly huge amount of snow, too.  Not nearly as much as Newfoundland, but for the Vancouver, Canada area, it's incredible. They've had about 14 inches of snow this month, compared to a normal of about four inches.

The snow there typically melts fast and doesn't stick around, but this time, it did. The next clip is from the famous Chilliwack, British Columbia security camera, which seems to catch an incredible number of odd happenings.

This clip is of all the people there who can't drive in the snow. And you thought it was bad here in Vermont! Watch:

Why You Don't Want To Be In Alaska This Month

Ice fog often forms around Fairbanks, Alaska, when it gets very
cold, like it is now up there. Photo by John Dougherty/KTVF

Frankly, I would never want to be in Alaska in January. No matter which year.

Heck, I'm such a wimp that I'm too cold this month in Vermont, and it's been a much warmer than normal January.

Not so in Alaska. That state came off its warmest year on record in 2019 but that northern state has had quite a flip to start 2020.  

It's damn cold up there, even by their standards.

Take Fairbanks, Alaska (Please!). The average temperature there so far this month is -21.2 degrees Which is 13.1 degrees below normal through January 27. (That their normal January temperature is alround 8 below is another chilly story).

It's been at least 30 below on 16 days this month in Fairbanks, with the lowest reading dropping to 43 below On ten days, the high failed to get above minus 20.

Unbelievably, the odd thing about the cold in Fairbanks is not how frigid it is. It's just that it's been consistently cold.  Fairbanks typically gets January "thaws" in which you get spells in temperatures rise all the way into the teens and 20s above zero. But not this year. The hottest day so far this January up there reached to 4 above zero.

The Fairbanks cold is nowhere near to breaking any records. While many nights have gotten into the 30s below zero this month, most record daily record lows in January are within a few degrees either side of minus 60.  Ugh!

Down in "tropical" southern Alaska, its the same cold story this month.   Anchorage has never had a January in which the temperature has failed to get to 24 degrees or above. This month, it has only gotten as high as 22 degrees this month.  There is a chance, just a chance it could get warmer than that in Anchorage Wednesday before the frigid air returns.

Not all of Alaska is in their version of the deep freeze. On the northern tip of Alaska, the community of  Utqiagvik, formerly Barrow has had an average temperature so far this month of minus 11.3 degrees. That sounds awful, but that's still 1.9 degrees warmer than average.

It's this cold in Alaska this winter because the overall weather pattern is vastly different than it has been in recent winters.  Winters lately have featured relatively weak jet stream and steering pattern winds over the Arctic.

That helped create big dips and bulges in the jet stream. That pattern has allowed big chunks of very cold air to plunge south into places like the United States. It also allowed plumes of mild air to stream north into places like Alaska.

This year, the jet stream winds in the northern hemisphere are pretty strong and generally west to east, keeping the cold air bottled up in the far north. It also keeps the Polar Vortex way up there.

The Polar Vortex, as you remember, is this very normal pool of frigid air up over the Arctic. Sometimes, pieces of it break off, causing those frigid outbreaks in places like the United States and western Europe.  Not this year. That's why it's been such a warm January across most of the continental U.S., including here in Vermont.

It's hard to say whether this pattern will maintain itself through the rest of the winter and early spring.

There are a few signs that the jet stream might buckle a little bit, allowing a few squirts of Arctic air into places like the United States, and a few shots of somewhat milder air to go up into Alaska. We'll see!

I guess it was time for Alaska to turn cold. As noted above the year 2019 was easily the warmest year on record in Alaska. Four of the last six years in Alaska have been the warmest on record, so this January has been an exception, for sure.

Would You Live In This Frozen Apartment Block?

I hate cold rooms in the winter.

You sit around, you want to read a book, watch TV, whatever, and it's cold. By cold, I mean 64 degrees or so. I'm wimpy.

So I wrap myself in fleece or a blanket and go about my day.

Imagine, though, if you lived in a building that was filling up with ice.

That's the fate of some people who live in a Siberian apartment block, in which the heat system, which is supposed to be powered by hot water, basically fell apart.

The large apartment block in Irkutsk, Siberia, has been filling up with ice from those broken water pipes.

The weather in Irkutsk is currently mild by their standards. (Highs mostly in the teens, lows between 5 above and 10 below most days, which is a good five to 10 degrees above normal for them).

There are still a few corners of the building that have heat, and the few remaining residents are huddling in those parts of the structure.  But so far, municipal officials have not moved these families out of this obviously dangerous building.

On top of that, spring will eventually come to Irkutsk.  What will happen when that huge volume of ice within that building will melt?

Here's a news video about the situation, with some breathtaking images from inside the building:

Why Vermont Winter Fans Shouldn't Be Too Upset With Weekend Rain

It looks like some enormous snow flakes landed outside my
front door in St. Albans, Vermont overnight at the tail end
of that rainy, sleety, icy mess of a storm. 

As expected, it rained yesterday and last night in Vermont, mixing with sleet and freezing rain in many places. Even a bit of snow fell here and there.

While winter sports types are probably not happy the mixed precipitation wrecked some nice powder out there, I don't think everybody should be super upset with this.

No, snow conditions aren't ideal out there. And the snow cover is not nearly as thick as it is during some winters in the North Country.

But look at where we stand.

Unlike the mega thaw and record warmth we saw back on January 11, which erased pretty much all of the snow cover,  this time it was too cold for much snow melt.

Temperatures stayed near or under 40 degrees, so in most of the state, there is still some snow cover and it still looks like winter. There's still enough snow left in quite a few places for cross country skiing.

The rain really did hardened up and compact the snow that remains out there. If it snows again that hard packed snow will create a decent base, which will also be a little harder to melt due to its high water content.

Downhill slopes at ski resorts will be groomed out today to become acceptable for skiers and riders. Granted, this is certainly no power day, but it's, well, passable.

We are in a weather regime today through Tuesday morning in which the mountains could easily get several inches of snow.  Moist west winds and upper level disturbances are creating lift. That means lots of snow showers, especially in places where winds need to go up and over mountain ranges.

Most Vermont valleys will have only light snow showers, and it will be a little too warm today and Monday to see any real accumulation there. But with at least a few inches of new snow due along pretty much the entire Green Mountain ridge line, that'll keep things in winter mode.

Starting Monday night and continuing at least into Friday, it will turn colder in Vermont.  Not frigid, mind you, but colder. It will be plenty cold for ski resorts to make snow, but warm enough (highs in the 20s) to still get outdoors and enjoy the season.

One last thing: I"m going to dangle another potential storm before your eyes.  It's still too soon to say if a storm next weekend will actually hit, and whether it will dump some snow on the Green Mountain  State. But at least there's the possibility that it might, so it's worth watching.

You Know The Drill: Icy, Icky Vermont Weekend

Another icy, yucky weekend in Vermont.  Not as much as in this photo
from January 12, but still the risk of icy roads, sidewalks, etc. 

True to form for this winter: It's another weekend, and we have another not huge but still icky storm to deal with.

Unlike last weekend, when we were treated to just snow, which was nice, this one is still looking to be a mostly schmutz event.

So we go through this drill again. We watch out for icy roads, and we have to pick our way gingerly over frozen, slippery sidewalks. Some spots are just wet and fine, then you find an icy patch and down you go.  

Temperatures for this entire storm statewide are going to be pretty close to the freezing mark. With some warm air coming in aloft, that means rain, freezing rain and a little sleet for just about everyone, starting this afternoon.

Areas outside the broader valleys in Vermont are most likely to get the ice.  Accordingly, a winter weather advisory is up for everybody in the Green Mountain State except those in the Champlain Valley, western Rutland County and the lower Connecticut River Valley.

Ice accumulations won't be extreme, so we're not looking at a lot of tree or power line damage, but the roads will be lousy this afternoon and tonight.

In those warmer valleys, it will be mostly rain with a huge caveat.  It's January. The ground is cold. Even if temperatures are a little above freezing while it's raining, that rain will freeze on untreated surfaces. You know, driveways, back roads, parking lots and sidewalks. You'll still want to be cautious as this mess goes through today and overnight.

Here's an added bonus for this lousy weather for those of you who live along the western slopes of the Green Mountains. Strong downslope winds will develop this afternoon and tonight, and there might be a few gusts over 40 mph or even above that in these spots.

Despite all the rain and freezing rain in the forecast, it won't be enough to cause any flooding. Some rivers might to up a little. But the rain won't come down nearly as hard as it did during the January 11 storm, and it won't be warm enough to rapidly melt snow. So we're OK there.

Now the usual caveat: As I said, temperatures will be close to 32 degrees during this. If it's only a degree or two colder or warmer in any one location than anticipated, it will be either much icier or just wetter. As they say, results may vary.

Late tonight or early tomorrow morning, the precipitation will turn lighter and more showery.  Colder air aloft will move in during the day Sunday, but it won't translate down to the surface much. That means mid and high elevations can expect a couple inches of snow during the day Sunday, but valleys will get just wet snowflakes maybe mixed with some rain drops.

Everyone will get into the snow showers Sunday night, but accumulations won't add up to all that much.

Most of the upcoming week looks like it will be mostly dry with seasonably cold temperatures.  It's looking like a fairly good bet that next weekend will bring another storm, but nobody has any idea yet what kind of storm it will be, or how strong it will get.

Watch Out For Those Extremely Scummy Disaster Scammers!

Be very cautious when going on Instagram and viewing appeals
to help disaster zones like Australia. There's lots of scams out there. 

Lots and lots of people want to help the people, animals and the entire nation and continent of Australia these days.

Who can blame them? Those extreme bushfires over the past few months have been absolutely tragic. There's big loss of life for people - 28 at last count.

So many Australians homes and livlihoods have been destroyed. So many Australian animals need our help. And the fire season
is far from over, despite recent rains that have thankfully doused some of the blazes.

So yes, give, give, give to Australia!

However, some of the scummiest human beings in the world are on social media, claiming they want to help and are more than willing to take your money toward that aim. But their real aim is to just enrich themselves with your heartfelt but naive donation. To them, the hell with Australia, that wild fire is a great opportunity to make themselves some big cash.

Even better for the scammers, there always seems to be new disasters elsewhere in the world to exploit. It's a constant money making machine to them.

Social media giants like Instagram are willing to help with this scam, because it makes money for them, too.

As HuffPost tells us:

"Popular Instagram profiles are exploiting the crisis for personal gain, making empty promises to plant trees or donate money in exchange for traffic with posts such as "1 LIKE = $1 DONATION."  Some falsely claim to be affiliated with legitimate aid organizations. Others have promoted personal PayPal accounts, urging their tens or hundreds of thousands of followers to donate to them directly while vowing to give those funds to charity later on."

Here's some examples provided by Huff Post:

Instagram accounts @thewildfund and @australiasafety, each have well over 50,000 followers. Both of them said they would donate $1 per like to their "partner," National Geographic. For every follow, each of these said they would give $5.

The accounts got more than a million "likes" and a surge of new followers. That translates into big income on Instagram, but there's no evidence money went to Australians who needed it. Both of the above Instagram pages HuffPost contacted were removed right after that contact, which all but proves they were scams.

Here's more from HuffPost:

"@australiasafety also claimed that it had already given away $450,000, linking to a nonexistent website, australiasafety.org. Neither of the account owners responded to requests for comment."

Of course they didn't.

Facebook owns Instagram, and Facebook really doesn't give a crap if these scams flourish on their social media platforms.  Facebook and Instagram policy is to not run scams on their platforms, but very often, these scam sites aren't taken down unless they generate an outcry or bad publicity.'

Even when they are  taken down, the scammers reappear instantly with new scams.

On the bright side there are other Instagramers who are fighting back against the scammers.   According to Slate, there is an Instagram account called @exposinginstascams, which it calls one of the most diligent bullshit detectors.

Apparently, @exposinginstascams is run by a 15-year-old named Nico from the San Diego area. He's the one who contacted National Geographic (see above) and blew up the scam by making National Geographic aware of it.

Nico told Slate:

"Instagram can be super profitable when it comes to ads and selling accounts....People use emotional tactics to get people to follow them, then they can easily make a big buck off of this exploitation of global issues."

On one other small bright side, Nico has investigated other Instagram accounts that claimed to be raising money for Australia and found them to be on the up and up. He posts links to those accounts. For instance, one Instagram account pledged $1 for every person who shared that Instagram post. About 5,000 people did so, and that Instagram account legitimately sent $5,000 to Australian bush fire relief.

Unfortunately, these truly charitable Instagram accounts appear to be the exception rather than the rule. As Slate writer Jane C. Hu notes:

"....when there's a major disaster in the news, the scam machine runs into overdrive. New accounts (or old ones, repurposed for whatever new disaster has occurred) pop up, and reporting them to Instagram is like whack-a-mole; in spending just two minutes scrolling through posts with the hashtag #prayforaustralia, I found at least three more sketchy-looking accounts claiming to donate up to $10 per 'like.' 

 A rash of fake donation accounts also followed the Amazon wildfire disaster and the Sudan crisis, and I asked Nico why these scams take off. 'People want to help, but they want someone else to do it for them,' he says. 'They want to feel like they are contributing to the world.'"

So how is a poor, compassionate person who wants to help Australia make sure they're not being scammed.

Take Nico's advice. Don't let someone else do it for you.  Or at least investigate to exactly to whom you want to contribute.

I'd avoid Instagram, Facebook and other social media platforms when considering giving to any charity.  Look into a charity independently of any social media, and make sure it's well established and has a good reputation.

Avoid the middlemen. Some people who say they will give your money to a major charity are scammers. Others are not, but are so inexperienced in this arena that they mess up, and the money doesn't go to the intended target.

If you insist on donating via Instagram or other social media advertiser, you can tap the menu and select "About This Account," advises CBS News. 

At that point, you can at least figure out when that account joined Instagram, in which country it originates, accounts with shared followers, and you can see all the ads the business is running.  That's a start, at least.

Just so you'd know what you're up against, though, consider this experience the HuffPost had when reporting their story. They contacted one Instagrammer regarding their lie about donating $25,000 to the Red Cross.

The Instagram account holder had two demands: That HuffPost give a shout out to his page in its article, and they wanted to be paid for the interview.

Yeah, pretty lame.

Calm Winter Weather Causing Air Pollution Issues In Vermont

The lovely city of Rutland, Vermont is in a bowl-shaped valley,
which makes it prone to inversion-caused air pollution problems
in the winter. Other Vermont valleys are similary at risk.

It's a very calm week, weather wise in Vermont. Most of us, including me, enjoy this.

Temperatures are moderate, there's no precipitation, and you want to get outside. It's really perfect winter weather.

Or is it?

When it's this calm, inversions often set up in the winter. That's when there's a warmer layer of air aloft which acts as a lid. That keeps pollutants from blowing away. Instead, soot, particulates or whatever accumulate in the air, especially in valleys.

This usually isn't such a problem in the summer. At that time of year, the sun is strong. The sunshine blasts onto the surface of the Earth, including in Vermont valleys. That leads to updrafts, which basically mixes the air, breaks up inversions and dilutes pollution. A lot of that pollution gets caught up in winds aloft, and blows away. Good riddance.

In the winter, the sun is much weaker. There's no blasting of heat to cause updrafts. So the warm air stays in place aloft.  And down in our Vermont valleys our wood stoves, our pellet stoves, our cars and whatever else belches into the air. And it has nowhere to go.

Which is why the National Weather Service in Burlington, Vermont has issued an air quality alert for Rutland County until 11 p.m. Friday.

The area around Rutland is notorious for this in the winter. Rutland City, and surrounding towns, are essentially at the bottom of a bowl, surrounded by mountains. So, when there's an inversion, exhaust from all our stuff goes into the air, that pollution just sits there, which everyone around Rutland gets to breathe.

Oh joy!

This pollution is mainly in the form of particulates. These particulates are usually tiny bits of soot. When we breathe that soot, the particulates go into the tiniest passages of our lungs, where they can get stuck.

The level of pollution in valleys like those in Rutland County probably won't majorly hurt young whippersnappers and generally healthy people.  By the way, this problem isn't limited to Rutland County through Friday.

As the National Weather Service notes, other populated Vermont valleys, like in the Barre-Montpelier area, parts of the Connecticut River valley and other areas of Vermont surrounded by mountains, the air isn't going to be so great through Friday

But for people who have health problems, especially those with lung disease, have cardiopulmonary problems or are elderly should stay indoors. For instance, my mother, age 90, has COPD and lives in West Rutland. She needs to stay indoors until this problem goes away.

This problem will go away on Saturday. Some storminess is coming in, which would tend to increase winds and disperse the particulate pollution.

Vermont has a pretty well deserved reputation as being environmentally friendly. But we're far from perfect, and we are completely capable of sinking into air pollution problems.

Another Weekend, Another Tricky Vermont Storm Due

One depiction of the expected storm system this weekend
has it well inland over central New England. That would
give us a warmer storm, with an increased chance of
mixed precipitation rather than snow.

I'll take an initial crack at the next storm coming along to Vermont. True to form this winter, it's coming on a weekend. And, true to form, what will actually come from the sky is questionable.

As of this Thursday morning, it's too soon to really go into specifics.  This post will just be broadbrush.  I do know there's been a major trend northward in the computer models all week.

Back on Sunday and Monday, it appeared to me this next system would go by so far to the south that only southern Vermont had a shot of precipitation.

Now, the models are so far north that a mix or rain is in play. (The further north a storm goes, the more likely it will be warm enough for a changeover).

Like the last two systems, this won't be a blockbuster for us, no matter what type of precipitation falls. Early indications are most places would get a quarter to a half inch of rain or melted snow and ice. That's very similar to the last two storms, basically a mid-sized kind of thing.

Those two storms were all snow, so now we have a respectable, but not spectacular snow cover on the ground.  It's still early, so I don't know how much damage, if any, this next storm will do to that snow cover. In fact, some areas might get end up with a better snow pack than now, who knows?

The overall storm set up will be familiar to those watching how this winter has been going. One storm will head up toward the Great Lakes and a new one will get going somewhere near the Mid-Atlantic states or East Coast.

The latest predictions have this secondary storm taking an inland route through the Northeast. That would bring milder air north, which is what is making everybody question what type of precipitation will come down.

Jackson the Weather Dog sniffing out snow prospects for the next
storm in Vermont, due this weekend. 

On top of that, there's not a lot of cold air to our north in Quebec to feed into the system.

Any snow we get with this is most likely near the onset of precipitation Saturday, and near the end of this on Sunday, as somewhat colder air moves in behind the storm.

Obviously, there's still a lot of questions with this storm. If the trends keep bringing it north, this thing will be mostly rain.  If the forecast trends reverse themselves, a more southerly track would keep most of Vermont in the snow.

Because of the lack of cold air to feed into this system, any snow we do get will probably be wet and heavy.

After the storm, it will only be seasonably cold, or even a little milder than average for this time of year early next week.  If you want a brutal blast of frigid Arctic air, it's not coming within the next week or so that's for sure.

Odds And Ends: British Pressure, Raining Iguanas And Strange Tornado Warnings

Record high barometric pressure in London, England is among the
odd but mostly not dangerous weather events this week
around the world.

Some or all of the stuff in this post today might seem a bit isoteric, but they're really not.  But they are examples of how weather and climate can be interesting to watch even when the actual weather you're feeling isn't extreme at all.

We've had record high pressure in Great Britain. It was at least potentially raining iguanas in South Florida because of a chilly spell, and what was the deal with those tornado warnings along the winter dreary coast of Washington State?

LONDON PRESSURE 

The other day, London, England recorded its highest barometric pressure on record, which is impressive, since they've been keeping track of such things there for over 300 years.

According to Weather Underground's Category 6 blog, the mean sea-level pressure at Heathrow Airport was 1049.6 mb or 30.99 inches Sunday evening.

Record high pressures were also reported in France, Belgium and elsewhere on Sunday.

The record high pressure in London is really cool for weather geeks, but Londoners didn't exactly suffer under these condtiions. Record low pressure is associated with extreme storminess, but record high pressure usually brings fair weather.

In North America, near record high pressure is associated, at least in the winter, is usually associated with extremely cold Arctic outbreaks. But in England and western Europe, this record high pressure just brought fair and just relatively chilly air to the region

As Category 6 points out, though, if the pressure is high somewhere, it has to be low somewhere else.

When the air pressure is high, air is sinking in that spot. When air pressure is low, it's rising.

You read here the other day about that mammoth blizzard in Newfoundland. That was an extremely strong storm, with very low barometric.  That meant a lot of air was rising. (Rising air also means lots of precipitation, so no wonder it snowed so hard in Newfoundland.)

But that rising air has to end up somewhere. What goes up, must come down, so all that air that rose near Newfoundland sank near the United Kingdom.  With lots of sinking air the air pressure at the surface got to record high levels.

Another thing that happened is related: When there's a contrast over short distances between high pressure and low pressure, you get a lot of wind.

A storm hit Spain this week causing incredible amounts of wind and coastal flooding.  The storm, which is of course an area of low pressure, in Spain wasn't too, too strong as storms go. But the contrast between the mid-strength storm in Spain and the very high pressure to its north brought the wind, tides and towering, destructive waves.

Video of that storm, definitely worth watching, is at the bottom of this post.

FLORIDA WIND CHILLS AND IGUANAS

A burst of chilly air came into Florida this week. Well, it least it was chilly for them.

The Florida cold weather made a lot of news, not because it was so extreme in a historical context, but because these cold snaps have become increasingly rare in the Sunshine State due to global warming.

Early this morning, it got down to 40 degrees in Miami, which was the coldest it's been there since December, 2010. That sounds impressive, but the record low temperature for the date there is 30 degrees, so they didn't even get close to a record.

Still, 40 degrees is chilly for South Florida. The National Weather Service in Miami issued an unusual statement telling residents to not be surprised if iguanas fall from the trees in the cold.

When temperatures get into the 40s, iguanas stiffen up and basically shut down, so they'll fall from the trees. Some might die, but many if not most will recover. People were told to leave seemingly dead iguanas alone, because they'd likely recover if warmed up and maybe bite you.

The National Weather Service also issued wind chill advisories for South Florida yesterday, warning of air with wind that would make it feel like it was in the 20s and 30s outside.

To us winter hardy northerners, that seems laughable because a January day in the 30s is a warm spell. But people in Florida aren't used to such temperatures, so the advisory to stay well dressed to ward off hypothermia was smart.

Of course, the NWS used the standard language used all across the United States for wind chill advisories, so the statement also alerted people to the possibility of frostbite. That is impossible if actual temperatures stay above freezing, as they did in South Florida

PACIFIC NORTHWEST TORNADOES?

A series of storms off the Pacific Ocean has kept the western Washington and Oregon pretty wet this month, and that parade of wet weather will continue this week.

A particularly rembunctious storm came ashore in Washington yesterday, accompanied by rotating thunderstorms that had the potential to unleash tornadoes.

At one point late Tuesday afternoon, four separate tornado warnings were in effect for coastal Washington. There have been no confirmed tornado touchdowns in Washington so far but an EF-0 twister did hit coastal Oregon Tuesday, causing minor damage.

Tornadoes are rare in this area, though every once in awhile a strong Pacific storm can set off a tornado.

Here's a video of the incredible coastal waves in Spain caused by that storm and the very high pressure to the north:

Australia's Weather Goes Bonkers

On top of everything else, a massive dust storm ripped through parts
 of southeastern Australia this week.  

I"m going to need to re-name this blog, "Australia Weather Rapport" since all the extremes and action, not to mention the politics of weather are happening Down Under.

Sure, those super destructive, super scary bush fires are still a threat. Summer isn't over in Australia yet.

But this week, new extreme weather decided to enter the mix. These included massive dust storms, massive hail storms and some serious flash floods.

No doubt some of the storms were extremely welcome. After all, they doused some of those fires. A win! Yet with all the damage Australia has suffered in the past couple of months, the hail, the wind, the floods, the dust, just added that much more devastation.

Who knows what will happen next in Australia? As the several dramatic videos below show, I'm sure Australians just want their awful summer of 2020 to end.

Here's an overview from The Guardian:



The Australlian Capital of Canberra was especially hard hit with hail as supercell thunderstorms rolled through. Sydney got nailed, too. Here's a News 9 report:



Not a nice day at this Canberra outdoor restaurant:



Aftermath of hail in Canberra makes it look like they were hit by a New England style winter storm:



Meanwhile, elsewhere in Australia, check out this kabob/dust storm in part of New South Wales this week: This wall of dust was reportedly was 180 miles long as it rolled over the region. When the dust storm hit the town of Dubbo, winds reached around 66 mph.

Wild Videos Of Tornados Crashing Through South Carolina High Schools

Serious damage at a South Carolina high school after a tornado
struck it this month. Nobody was inside when this twister
hit on a Saturday night. 

Two South Carolina high schools were hit by tornadoes this month, but luckily in one case, nobody was in the school. In the second case, the twister hit the parking lot, but missed the actual high school building.

Dramatic vidoes of both tornadoes are at the bottom of this post.

Let's start with the high school parking lot tornado.  

It was an unexpected one, but it did yield some dramatic video, and a case lesson on how small, relatively weak tornadoes can be potentially deadly.

In this case, nobody was hurt when the tornado went through a high school parking lot, damaging dozens of cars. The twister tossed a few on top of each other.

You might have to watch the video at the bottom of this post  a couple times to catch the narrow funnel cloud going across the parking lot and tossing the vehicles. But it is something to behold.

As is often the case with tornadoes, this one is pretty narrow, so many of the vehicles in the parking lot do just fine.

The tornado goes to prove that it doesn't take a particularly large or strong tornado to put people in danger.

The tornado was an EF-1, with winds of 90 mph.  It hit the campus of Loris High School in Horry County South Carolina on Monday, according to numerous news reports, including television station WPDE  in Florence, South Carolina.

About 75 cars were damaged, and some of them were damaged, WPDE reported. 

Still, since classes were in session, we're glad the tornado didn't go through the high school instead. It would have only damaged part of the high school, but the part were students would have been in could have been really in trouble.

There was no tornado warning in effect at the time.  Meteorologists at the nearest National Weather Service office were tracking the parent thunderstorm and detected some weak rotation within it. But that rotation didn't seem strong enough to set off a tornado.

But it did. The rotation was just enough to set off a relatively weak tornado in a place where it could have hurt people.

This is another reason why you should take severe thunderstorms seriously.  You'll often hear a mention of weak rotation within the oncoming storm. Much more often than not, when the rotation is weak, you won't get a tornado. But in the case of Loris County, South Carolina, and I am sure many other instance it did. And it could happen any time.

This was the second time within a week that a tornado struck a South Carolina high school. On January 11, a  EF-2 tornado with winds up to 130 mph hit North Central High School in Kershaw County, South Carolina. Security cameras there yielded even more dramatic videos than the parking lot tornado.

Because it was a weekend, nobody was in the school, so nobody was hurt.

Which is a good thing Since so many people are in schools, they can be dangerous places to be in tornadoes.

Back on March 1, 20017 an EF-4 tornado with top winds of 170 mph hit Enterprise High School in Alabama, killing eight students and injuring 50.

Here's the video:



Here's surveillance video of another high school hit at night a few days before the video of the one above in South Carolina. Glad nobody was in there. Hallways turned into dangerous wind tunnels:

Vermont Snow Behaved. Wild Newfoundland Blizzard REALLY Did Not

A post-blizzard doorway in St. John's Newfoundland
Not enough snow in Vermont for anytbing like
that at the moment. 

The snowfall late yesterday and overnight in and around Vermont pretty much behaved as expected, with the usual spotty exceptions.

It was interesting to note that a fast south to southwesterly flow aloft during the height of the snow would use the Adirondacks to "shadow" parts of the Champlain Valley and yield less snow there.

That shadow seemed centered around Burlington, where at last check, the National Weather Service office reported 2.9 inches of new snow.  

As you travel north up the Champlain Valley, the shadowing effect of the Adirondacks lessened. Milton, several miles north of Burlington had 4.3 inches.  Here at my place in St. Albans, north of Milton, I measured 5.4 inches.  And Swanton, even further north than me, reported 6.3 inches.

The big winners were in northern Vermont, as opposed to southern Vermont as first surmised a couple days ago. Montgomery reported 11 inches of fresh powder and Hyde Park reported 10 inches.  There are many reports of five to eight inches of new snow across much of central and northern Vermont, away from the Champlain Valley.

Meanwhile, as of late last night, high elevation Readsboro in far southern Vermont only got a so-so 4.3 inches of new snow.

In the valleys, this storm is pretty much over. As temperatures slowly fall during the rest of the day, there will be snow showers and flurries and blowing snow in gusty winds to harass valley dwellers. There could be spots with new snow of around one inch during the day today.

In the central and northern Green Mountains, and parts of New York's Adirondacks and New Hampshire's White Mountains, winds rising up the slopes of these mountains will wring out more moisture, and provide a few more inches of snow today.

NEWFOUNDLAND BLIZZARD

A neighborhood in St. John's Newfoundland this weekend.
Photo by Ryan Crocker. 

An earlier midsized snow, similar to the one we got last night, went through Vermont Wednesday night and Thursday morning.

That Thursday storm blew up once it got off the coast of Maine and started heading up through the Atlantic Provinces of Canada.

By the time the storm got up to Newfoundland, it was a beast to say the least.

To begin with, the area around St. John's Newfoundland isn't exactly known for its lovely winter weather.

Way up there north on the frigid Atlantic Coast, it's stormy, dark and cold all winter. The relatively warm waters of the Atlantic keep St. John's relatively warm in the winter, for a location so far north.  Normal highs up there this time of year are near 30 and lows are usually in the teens.

But St. John's, a picturesque city with a population of about 114,000, in the winter is a terribly stormy place. People there are used to it. But this week's blizzard was beyond the pale.

The blizzard dumped around 30 inches of snow on St. John's, which is a record deep snowfall or that city. Winds gusted to 80 mph or so, and 100 mph right along the coast, causing enormous drifts. Some of those drifts reached second story windows. Countless cars in the city were completely buried.

Canadian armed forces were ordered to enter the St. John's area to begin digging them out.

In one neighborhood that clings to a steep hill in St. John's an avalanche slammed into a house, filling the kitchen and living room with snow, Luckily, nobody was hurt.

Unfortunately, one person is missing in the blizzard.

The storm that came through Vermont last night will also affect St. John's, but it won't be as bad as the last one. Environment Canada predicts about four inches of new snow coming up in St. John's, and also a a little blowing snow, then a little rain and drizzle, with winds gusting as high as 45 to 50 mph.

Some Newfoundland/St John's videos:

The first half of this news cast is something:



Here's the progress of the blizzard in one neighborhood:



Here's quite a time lapse:

Saturday Evening Vermont Snow Forecast: A Quick Thumping, Then Lighter

The flat, gray light of pre-snow St. Albsns, Vermont at around
3:30 p.m. today That smooth, gray look to the sky was snow falling
from the clouds, but evaporating before reaching the ground.
The air had to moisten more beore snow started reaching the
ground a the first flurries of this storm at around 4:30 p.m. 

As of 4 p.m Saturday, snow was spreading southwest to northeast across Vermont, as expected.

For hard core weather geeks like myself, this has been kind of an interesting afternoon. The snow spreading in from the southwest has been encountering very dry air over us.

It has actually been snowing high overhead in Vermont since late this morning or early afternoon, depending upon where you've been in the Green Mountain State.

That's why the outdoor light today has been flat and gray and rather dark.  

The snow moving in earlier today fell into dry air and evaporated.

But that snow has moistened a layer of the atmosphere high overhead. More snow comes in, and it's able to get through that now-moistened high level air air, then encounters the lower level dry air, and evaporates.

The air gets wetter and wetter going from way up high to down low, until the entire mass of air above us allows snow to reach the ground.

You could see that in northern Vermont, looking at the Adirondacks and Green Mountains during the mid and late afternoon. The mountaintops got blurry, indicating the falling snow was reaching the summits before evaporating at lower elevations,

Gradually, the blurriness headed lower and lower down the slopes until the snowflakes arrive in the valleys.

This is one of those storms in which, when the air finally gets moist enough to support snow without evaporation, we basically go from 0 mph to 100 mph. Light snow develops, then quickly becomes heavy.

So, as we go through the rest of the late afternoon and evening, expect light snow to start, then, after a fairly brief period of not so impressive snowfall, it'll  get pretty heavy pretty fast.  Look for snow fall rates lasting a couple hours or a little more of one inch per hour. That's not record breaking, but pretty impressive.

As this snow keeps going from southwest to northeast over Vermont, there will be that embedded band of heavy snow. It'll make you think we're going to get more snow than forecast, it will be coming down that hard.

But nope, snow totals are still expected to be in the the three to eight inch range, with locally more in far southern Vermont and in the mountains of central and northern Vermont.

This expected band of heavy snow this evening won't last that long in any one place. After a few hours, it will have passed through.

In southern Vermont, forecasters have generally cut back on the amount of snow expected. Most of far southern Vermont was originally expected to get a good six to 10 inches of snow with higher amounts in some spots. Now, it's looking like around four or five inches or snow in valleys like around Bennington and Brattleboro, with eight or nine inches up high in places like Wilmington and Dover.

After midnight, the snow will be lighter, more showery and not that big a deal starting after midnight.  So basically, this isn't a huge storm, but the timing is lousy for people who had Saturday evening dinner or show reservations in Vermont.

All this heavier stuff coming through this evening is actually in advance of the storm. The storm center itself will pass by over northern Vermont or just north of there tomorrow.

That'll bring in a fast flow of air from the west.  That air will have some wetness to it, and will pick up some additional moisture from the Great Lakes.

That means during the day Sunday, it'll keep snowing in the western Adirondacks. The the air will flow up and over the Adirondacks and down into the Champlain Valley and valleys of western Vermont.

Sinking air, like the stuff that will be coming down the slopes of the Adirondacks Sunday, tends to dry out.  So the valleys of western Vermont won't see too much more snow Sunday. Just some occasional snow showers. If we get some extra instability in the atmosphere, snow showers in those valleys might briefly come down relatively hard, but not last long, so it won't be a big deal. Just a dusting. Maybe an inch or two in favored spots.

Then the air has to rise again, going up the western slopes of the Green Mountains. Rising air cools, and wrings moisture from the atmosphere as it does so. Which means forecasters still expect snow to continue much of Sunday on those western slopes and on the summits. That's great for the ski areas, right?

It's been a cold day, with highs mostly in the low teens. It'll warm into the 20s overnight, and get to the 25-32 degree range Sunday morning before starting to fall off again in the afternoon.

Monday and Tuesday, we're still expecting a  run-of-the-mill January chilly spell with highs in the teens and lows near zero.  Don't worry, you'll survive. This is normally, on average, the coldest point of winter. The expected weather early in the week isn't even remotely close to how cold it can really get this time of year. We've often had mornings in the 20s and 30s below in Vermont in mid and late January. Zero degrees is a heat wave compared to that.

Plus, we'll  turn mild again starting Wednesday and especially beyond that. The good news, if you like snow on the ground,  is this doesn't look like it will be some huge January thaw again. Highs will reach the 30s in the valleys, causing some minimal melting but nothing scary. Mountains should hold on to their new snow just fine.

No real storms are expected until next Saturday at the earliest, and frankly, even that looks iffy.

Vermont Snow Update: Remarkably Few Changes In Forecast

That old familiar National Weather Service snowfall map again.
Least snow in the Champlain and Connecticut River valleys
with this one. Southern and northern ends of Vermont and the
Green Mountains do the best. 

Yet another moderate snowfall is coming our way, as we mentioned yesterday.

As of this Saturday morning, forecasts for this storm have remarkably changed pretty much not one iota since yesterday morning.

It was below zero early this morning across much of the region. This even as high clouds from the storm shroud the skies, shutting of the radiational cooling we had overnight to bring on these subzero temperatures.

Those clouds will thicken and lower pretty fast through the morning and snow will break out this afternoon across Vermont.

The snow will overspread Vermont southwest to northeast starting near Bennington early in the afternoon and reaching St. Johnsbury and points north and east later in the afternoon.  So if you've got errands to do today, finish them up before noon.

As we said yesterday, the front end of the storm will bring the heaviest snow.  The National Weather Service in South Burlington says it could come down at a rate of up to an inch per hour, especially in the time frame between about 4 p.m. today and midnight, depending upon where you are.

All this means the worst of this storm will come Saturday evening, so watch it if you have plans later today and tonight. Or just do what you were going to do some other night and stay home. That's what I'm doing. Netflix, anyone?

Given the south and southwesterly flow aloft, southern Vermont, and south facing slopes of other Vermont mountains and the Adirondacks will probably get the most snow, especially from this initial burst this evening.

Because the strong winds aloft will cause a "shadow" effect on the moisture coming in with the storm on the lee of the mountains, places like the Champlain Valley will probably have a little less snow than elsewhere.  Going forecasts call for three or four inches around Burlington, for instance.

As the storm begins to move east of us late tonight and especially tomorrow, winds will turn more southwesterly and westerly. That would limit additional snowfall in the Champlain and Connecticut River Valleys to just spotty light snow and flurries.

On the western slopes and summits of the Green Mountains, though, snow will  probably continue all day, with additional accumulations for you winter sports lovers out there.  It'll get pretty windy, so expect more blowing and drifting snow, like we did near the end of Thursday's snow.

Temperatures will be a bit weird through all this. It'll gradually warm up from this morning's subzero lows, and keep rising well into the 20s to near 30 overnight. But instead of continuing to rise during the day Sunday, like it normally would, readings will start to fall again through the day.

We have another brief semi-Arctic shot coming, with highs in the teens and lows near 0 Monday and Tuesday before it starts to warm up again.

Overall, the National Weather Service is calling for a general snowfall of three to eight inches. Higher amounts than that will be common in southern Vermont, and in the higher elevations of the central and northern Green Mountains.

Some of the big winners in the high elevations in far southern and in northern Vermont could easily see more than ten inches of new fluff out of this.  Overall, it will be another medium size storm, nothing we can't survive if we don't all go out and drive like idiots.

Active, But Not Extreme Weather In New England; Saturday Night Snow

That familiar National Weather Service snow prediction map. Click on it
to make it bigger and easier to see. It looks like the big winners in this
next storm will be southern Vermont. Northern mountains should
do OK, too.

The storm that brought our moderate snowfall to Vermont and much of the rest of northern New England got really HUGE after it left our neck of the woods.

As of this morning, the storm was crushing the eastern tip of Newfoundland, where the St. John's area is under a blizzard and storm surge warning from Environment Canada. 

That storm will continue on toward the southern tip of Greenland in the next couple of days. But that's not our concern.

Another system that's also currently producing blizzard warnings is on its way, but before you get too scared, we here in Vermont and the rest of the New England aren't going to get a blizzard. But we are going to get some snow.

The storm being watched today has triggered a blizzard warning for the eastern half of both Dakotas along with bits and pieces of Minnesota and Iowa. Winter storm warnings and winter weather advisories extend through a huge area of the nation's middle. I'm talking all the way from northern New Mexico and Texas all the way through the entire state of Michigan.

The culprit is a storm making its way east northeastward, across the central Plains. It'll make it to about Michigan Saturday evening, then move into the St. Lawrence River Valley and near northern Vermont early Sunday while fading. Meanwhile, a new, replacement storm will start to get going in the Gulf of Maine.

This will push a warm front our way, but relax, this time we're not really going to get into the mixed precipitation.

Instead, we'll endure the cold through tomorrow morning, when temperatures in many areas will be below zero again.  It will warm up and cloud up Saturday, and snow will start in the afternoon.

The way this looks for much of New England, including Vermont, this storm will feature a burst of pretty heavy snow at the onset during the first half of Saturday night.  Snowfall rates could be an inch per hour during this time.

A winter storm watch is up for far southern Vermont, areas near Albany, New York and a good chunk of southern New England.

For Vermont the far southern areas will get the best snow out of this, as it looks now. Which is good, because they largely missed out on yesterday's snow.   These areas should get a decent six to te inches of snow or more out of this. Some favored mountain areas could see a foot or even a little more of fresh powder by the end of the day Sunday.

The snow will become more showery and lighter late Saturday night and Sunday. This is a good set up for the central and northern Green Mountains, which should get a slower, but again, decent five to seven inches, with locally higher amounts, between Saturday afternoon and Monday morning.

The Champlain Valley looks like it will be sheltered from the best moisture, so current forecasts have that area getting only about three inches or so of new snow.

It'll pretty warm on Sunday - highs in the upper 20s and 30s - so you'll get to enjoy playing in that snow then.  We have another cold shot coming at us Monday and Tuesday and into Wednesday, but it will probably warm back up to near seasonal temperatures for awhile after that.

Vermont Snowfall Seems To Be Working Out Just As Expected

Looking out of my St. Albans, Vermonthouse past the wreath at a newly
nowy deck and surroundings

It's 11 a.m. on a lazy winter Thursday in St. Albans, Vermont.

I haven't even been outdoors yet, but it looks as if we have a good six inches of new snow at least out there, and it's still snowing a little bit.

It's one example of many of a moderate Vermont January snowfall that has pretty much worked out just as forecast.  

There are many reports of snow fall totals of near six inches so far. The most I've seen so far is 7.7 inches in Orange, Vermont, but I'm sure we'll get updates with higher totals.

Areas in the winter storm warning across the north and mountains had been under a forecast for six to 10 inches of accumulation, so it looks like the predictions will be spot on.

A few areas in the winter weather advisory areas that had been expected to get three to five inches are on the high end of that prediction.  The National Weather Service office in South Burlington, in that winter weather advisory zone, reports 5.5 inches of new snow, and was still snowing lightly there late this morning.

For most of us, the heaviest snow is behind us as of 11 a.m. Snow showers will continue  for many of us, but it won't amount to anything huge. Maybe a couple inches, with more in the mountains.  And isn't nice for this winter to get through an entire storm in which it just snows, and we don't get any ice, sleet, yuckiness and schmutz?

However, winter storm warnings continue across the north and mountains until 7 p.m. today, and winter weather advisories continue until the same time elsewhere.

That's a good move on the part of the National Weather Service in South Burlington.  As I said, light snow is continuing, roads are bad, and the wind is getting ready to pick up.

That'll really blow the snow around quite a bit through this afternoon. Visibility will be a problem with this blowing snow, especially in open areas.  Winds will gust to over 30 mph, so that's more than enough to cause a lot of blowing and drifting. If you went to work today, the drive home will probably be tricky, too.

I'm noticing winds just starting to pick up in St. Albans now. The snow is beginning to blow off the trees.

Temperatures were still on the mild side as of 11 a.m.,, hovering near 30 degrees. They'll start to fall this afternoon, and that will set us up for definitely a frigid spell.

By early tomorrow morning, actual temperatures will be near 0 and wind chills could be as nasty as 25 below.  As they say, bundle up, children!

It won't get that warm Friday afternoon, either.  Most of us Vermonters will stay at or below 10 degrees for highs.

The next storm comes in Saturday with a quick squirt of warmer air and also a quick squirt of snow.

At this point, the fast moving weekend storm won't have time to drop much snow, but a lot of spots will get a few more inches. So that's nice, I suppose.

Another Arctic cold spell, this one lasting longer than the one coming in tonight, will hit Sunday night through Wednesday.  The cold won't be anything spectacular for a Vermont January, but the air still will have a definite bite.

Look for lows at or below 0 for the first half of next week and highs in the single numbers and teens.

It looks, tentatively at least, that we're also entering a drier weather pattern.  I suppose it's possible some type of storminess might come up from the south or west in the final 10 days of the month, but that prospect is looking iffy at best.

Temperatures in the closing third of January also look like they will be near to a little below normal in Vermont, perhaps trending back to a little warmer than normal at the tail end of January.

Long range forecasts are not always accurate, so don't really take my word on this. But we do know one thing.  Winter's back!