Vermont Snow Tonight, Thursday Will Be Bigger Deal Than First Thought

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Northern areas will get the most snow out of the next system
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Yesterday, I told you Vermont, after a long period of warmer than normal temperatures, is at the start of a snow cover rebuilding period.

That snow cover will come in with a bigger initial oomph than first thought, at least across a good portion of Vermont.

Some areas will get more than half a foot of snow, which is a start, anyway.

The storm coming in from the southwest overnight will be strengthening as it does so.  It's a pretty dynamic system, so by the time it gets here, it will have enough energy to give us a pretty good amount of snow.  

The system has a lot of "lift" to it.  That means it will really encourage air to rise over us as more, fairly moist air comes into replace it.  Rising air means moisture in that air condenses and fall as precipitation. In general, the better the lift the heavier the precipitation.

So, the bottom line is we have a pretty good slug of snow coming in. This won't be a blockbuster in the grand scheme of things, but it looks like its going to be a relatively nice dump, especially in the northern mountains.

Total accumulation might be as little as two inches in far southeastern Vermont, but most of us can expect three to five inches of snow, says the National Weather Service in South Burlington.

The northern Champlain Valley, say around St. Albans, much of the rest of Vermont north of Route 2 and the central and northern Green Mountains are in for at least six inches of snow.

Where the six inch plus totals are expected, a winter storm warning is up, going from 11 p.m. tonight to 7 p.m. Thursday.  For the rest of us, there's a winter weather advisory. 

The heaviest snow looks like it will come during the early and perhaps mid morning. So yeah, your morning commute is going to be tricky. Plan on that. Starting tomorrow morning and especially in the afternoon, the wind will really pick up, so there will be a lot of blowing and drifting snow to deal with.  You'll be dealing with that when you come home from work in the afternoon.

There won't be much snow falling in the valleys by afternoon, but the mountains and western slopes should continue to see some more accumulating snow.

Gusts will easily go over 30 mph, so you'll notice it. Temperatures will also be falling during the course of the day, setting us up for the coldest cold shot since mid-December, or maybe since last winter.

It'll get near or below zero Thursday night, not climb out of the single digits Friday afternoon, then go below zero again Friday night, with the coldest areas getting close to 15 below.

That's not unusual at all for a Vermont January, but since we haven't really seen anything like that this last winter, it might come as a bit of a shock.

It still looks like it will snow over the weekend, but at this point, it doesn't look huge. Maybe another moderate three to five incher, we'll see.

Another sharp Arctic spell will return early next week.