Wintry Blast Heading To New England; Southern Tornadoes

Daffodil blooming in my St. Albans, Vermont this morning.
Let's hope this little fella survives temperatures in the low to
mid 20s Wednesday night! 

As expected tornadoes and severe weather rocked the South yesterday, though thankfully this one wasn't as bad as the outbreak a week earlier.

There were several tornadoes, and reports of one particularly large, strong one in Mississippi.

It appears that tornado mostly went through rural and pretty unpopulated areas, so not too many houses got wrecked this time. And thankfully, so far, no deaths have been reported.

It looks like there will be one more threat of some severe weather in the South, midweek, and then there will be a brief break lasting several days, in which there will be relatively few reports of severe weather and tornadoes.  At least that's the way it looks at the moment.

Up here in Vermont, we don't expect anything dramatic like tornadoes, of course. But after an early spring, winter still wants to regain control.  Watch out for wind gusts, and then a hard freeze.

We have another system coming in similar to what we've seen a few times this month already: A very dynamic, energetic disturbance will come in from the west and northwest.  Like the previous systems, recipitation amounts won't be overwhelming at all. Still,  you'll notice the weather on Tuesday.

Out ahead of the storm's strong cold front, gusty south winds will blow Tuesday morning, especiall in the Champlain Valley, where winds could go over 40 mph at times.

Crocuses like these blooming in my St. Albans, Vermont gardens
look fragile, but they're pretty tough. We'll see how well they do in
a really hard freeze expected Wednesday night. 

A band of showers, and maybe some thunderstorms will accompany the cold front, which at this point  looks like it will enter western Vermont in the early afternoon and then sweep east.

The front might be energetic enough to set off a few thunderstorms, especially in southern Vermont.  NOAA's Storm Prediction  Center has much of the Northeast in a marginal risk zone for severe thunderstorms and that zone extends into the southern half of Vermont.

There might be a few isolated thunderstorms that manage to create damaging wind gusts. In Vermont, if this happens at all, the damaging gusts will be few and far between.

The real story will be the intense cold behind the cold front, at least by April standards. After snow showers dust a few areas Tuesday night, high temperatures Wednesday will stay in the 30s in many northern areas, with a stiff northwest wind. The Champlain Valley and southern Vermont could squeak into the low 40s, but that's a far cry from the mid and upper 50s that are normal for this time of year.

Unfortunately, it looks like we're going to lose some of the early blooms that are out there right now.  Temperatures Wednesday night will bottom out between 15 and 25 degrees, with the teens up in the mountains and colder hollows.

Early flowers like daffodils and crocuses are pretty tough, but early varieties that are blooming now might not fare that well in that level of cold.  The plants themselves will be fine, but the some of the blooming daffodils and other flowers could wilt and die in those temperatures.

It depends upon how hardy yours are, but the prospect of even losing a few is a bit depressing.

Temperatures will kind of, sort of warm up later in the week and into the weekend, but still remain below normal, unfortunately.