The South Moves North Once Again

An outflow boundary from a thunderstorm passing by to the north
helped create thes turbulent looking clouds over St. Albans,
Vermont yesterday.  The boundary produced wind gusts close
to 30 mph at my house, but they oddly weren't cool winds like
you'd expect from normal thunderstorm outflow. 

The Northeast had a terribly Florida type of day Monday, with temperatures in the 90s, humidity levels through the roof, and a few strong storms to boot.

Maine was downright weird. You know Maine in the summer, right?  Cool breezes, comfortable humidity, great sleeping nights, manageable summer rain showers? frigid ocean waters?

Not yesterday.  The waters in the Gulf of Maine are practically bathwater, setting records for high ocean temperatures.  That means marine life is heading north to enjoy those warm waters. That includes sharks.

Tragically, a woman was killed in a shark attack near Bailey Island Maine on Monday.

Those warm waters along the coast of New England are also bad if a stray hurricane comes along later this summer and autumn.  Northboumd hurricanes along the coast weaken because they don't do well in cold water. The warmer the water, the slower a hurricane will weaken, making one that comes along stronger than they otherwise would be if the water was chillier.

Meanwhile, in Portland, Maine, the low temperature Monday was 78 degrees. That is the warmest "low" temperature on record for any date in Portland.

Additionally, a possible tornado hit parts of Somerset and Penobscot Counties in Maine.  Radar images showed some pretty tight rotation in a severe thunderstorm, plus there was tree and wire damage in the area.

The National Weather Service will investigate to see if that was really a tornado.

For those who are easily worried and confused, the possible tornado hit the town of St. Albans, Maine, NOT St. Albans, Vermont, where I live.

The heat was on elsewhere in the Northeast.  It was 97 degrees in Scranton, Pennsylvania, the hottest it's been there in four years.  Hartford, Connecticut got up to 98 degrees.

Ahead of a weak cold front, heat advisories are up along the East Coast today from southwestern Maine to South Carolina.

Here in Vermont, it got up to 93 degrees in Burlington, the 17th day this year it has been in the 90s.  We're still in the running for the most consective days staying continuously above 60 degrees. The wild cards are how warm it stays at night in the second half of the week and into Saturday.

Current forecasts have Burlington's lows just above 60 degrees each night, so we could do it.

Showers and thunderstorms were concentrated across northern Vermont yesterday and last evening, and southern Vermont stayed dry.  However, a decent batch of rain was moving through central and southern Vermont this morning.

Today will be another relatively hot one, with highs in the 80s to around 90 in a few spots. At least the humidity will briefly go down this afternoon.

The humidity will spike up again tomorrow ahead of the next system, but that won't last long.  There could be a few more showers and storms tomorrow, too.

Which is fine. Last evening, a brief heavy downpour passed through St. Albans, Vermont. The rain was almost as warm as bath water. There was no lightning, so it felt safe to stand out in the rain and let it drench me. It felt awesome.

I joke that the rain did wonders for my naturally curly hair.  The joys of summer, I guess.

Flash Flood Update: Damage, But Could Have Been Woirse

Haile remained piled up in Sanford, Maine after Tuesday morning's
intense hail storm. 

I'm sure there are plenty of residents around eastern Vermont, New Hampshire and western Maine trying to restore washed out driveways and damp basements in the wake of yesterday's flash flooding.

There is a fair amount of damage here and there, but it could have been worse, considering how hard the rain came down.  It seems like it let up just in time to prevent any kind of catastrophe.

Still, water flowed into two operating rooms at a hospital in Woodsville, New Hampshire, forcing the cancelation of two surgeries. Several roads in that area were closed by flooding.

In Vermont, storm reports include an eight by six foot section of road washed out in East Cabot, and another washed out road near St. Johnsbury.  St. Johnsbury itselt reported 1.83 inches of rain Tuesday. In Bradford, Vermont, about 3.5 inches of rain fell in less than six hours.

The most dramatic of the storms occured in southwestern Maine, where hail fell so heavily in some spots that snow plows were called out. A car dealership in Sanford, Maine ended up with more than 1,000 cars sustaining hail damage. 

A couple videos of the Maine hail storm at the bottom of this post.

In northwestern Vermont, the anti-rain force field held, as usual.  Not a drop of rain fell here in St. Albans, and just a trace was reported in Burlington.

The next shot of rain comes Thursday night as a weather front approaches from the west, then kind of washes out over or just past us. It still has enough oomph to give us at least a shot of some showers and scattered thunder Thursday night and Friday.

Videos:

Here's what the hail storm looked like in Biddeford, Maine:


A drive through the part of Maine that got hit by that hail storm.  Notice the ice accumulation and hail fog.  This dense fog often forms right after a hail storm as the hail cools the humid post-storm air near the ground.

That Flash Flood Threat Materialized For Some Of Us - Dangerously

While New Hampshire and eastern Vermont were flooding, incredible
hail piled up this morning near Wells, Maine. Photo by Shawna Marie
Druin via Twitter 

While those of us in northwestern Vermont had a quiet weather night and early morning, it was anything but in eastern Vermont and New Hampshire.

That flash flood threat I spoke of yesterday materialized in some of those spots. Thunderstorms, a few of them severe, and torrential showers and thunderstorms developed over night and are continuing in those regions this morning.

All this is a developing situation, but here's what we have as of mid-morning.

Flash flood warnings are up for most of central and northern New Hampshire and bits and pieces of eastern and northeastern Vermont.  

The trouble in New Hampshire is particularly severe, with reports of life threatening flooding in Woodsville, New Hampshire, just across the Connecticut River from Wells River, Vermont.

Water was said to be pouring into the local hospital in Woodsville. Rainfall rates further north in Sugar Hill, New Hampshire were as high as five inches per hour for brief periods.  Flash flood warnings were up this morning in Vermont near Woodsville, in towns like Wells River and Bradford.

As of 8:30 a.m. today, another big are of of  concern in Vermont is a stretch along Route 2 and surrounding hill towns between Marshfield and Danville. 

That flash flood warning near Route 2 was later extended further east and north to include St. Johnsbury and Lyndonville.  There is a river bank mobile home park along the Passumpsic River that is prone to flooding. I worry about that neighborhood this morning.

The rain has really come down hard there and was still pouring as o 9 a.m. Some spots were already up to 3 inches of rain in short order, with more falling. That gush of water is no doubt sweeping down steep hills and mountains, causing a potentially dangerous flash flood situation.

Ominously, the heavy rain appeared to be sitting nearly stationary on radar images over northeastern and eastern Vermont and western New Hampshire through mid-morning. This could get really, really bad.

The storms also look pretty intense, with plenty of lightning strikes in northern Vermont east of the Greens and northern New Hampshire. There's still the risk of severe storms, too, especially further east in New Hampshire and Maine. Hail completely covered the ground near Wells, Maine this morning. The dangerous weather could extend into northern Massachusetts as well.

The flood threat will continue today in those regions through the day, while those of us who were begging for a little piece of the action to the west in the Champlain Valley will see little or nothing.

The main culprit in the troublesome weather east of the Green Mountains is sometning I just talked about here in this blog thingy a couple weeks ago: A mesoscale convective system, or MCS. 

They're common in the Midwest and Plains.  They are much less frequent in New England, but certainly do happen, often with damaging results.

It's too early to really assesswhat kind of damage, ias happened in the area hit by this New England MCS.  I do know there were some severe thunderstorm warnings early this morning in addition to the flood threat.

Vermont is prone to flooding. Different parts of the state have been declared federal disaster zones 13 times in the past decade due to flooding.  I have no idea if today's possible flooding will rise to that level.

People outside the storm zone, like in the Champlain Valley, could see a great lightning show off to the east before dawn today.

In the New Hampshire flash flood warning zone, rainfall rates were/are at times one to three inches per hour, certainly enough to produce a flash flood.

The threat from this MCS, and upper level low pressure system will continue through much of the day as this mess slowly heads east.  Additonal showers and storms will form on the western edges of this in Vermont, mostlly east of the Green Mountains today, which could cause more high water problems.

The danger is even higher in New Hampshire and western Maine, since this mass of storms will keep firing up all day as the upper level low slowly moves overhead.

NOAA's Weather Prediction Center says the heavy rain and storms will persist and actually expand in  areal coverage going into this afternoon. Already, as of 10 a.m., a few showers had expanded into the central Champlain Valley.

In western Vermont, there likely won't be enough activity to cause flood trouble, but this forecast shows that anything east of the Green Mountains in particular might well be in continued trouble for the rest of the days.

Looking forward, we get a sort of break from the humidity tonight and Wednesday before it returns big time by the weekend.  There will be more threats of showers and storms with locally heavy rain occasionally between now and early next week.

Which probably means some areas of the region that are too dry will stay that way, but areas that are too wet face the risk of more water trouble.

You Think It's Hot Here? Go North To Maine/Canada For Real Heat

The more north you go, the hotter it gets. Forecast highs for
today. Northern Maine is expected to be in the mid-90s,
but it'll only be 80 degrees or so once you get
down to New Jersey. 

As expected, it was quite a hot day in Vermont Thursday. Burlington made it up to 92 degrees.  That was already the fourth day this year that made it to 90 degrees or better.

Normally, the Queen City has just five or six 90 degree days each summer, and most of those days come in July or August.

So we're ahead of the game. Especially since there's at least a chance today, tomorrow, or Sunday could also reach 90 degrees.  The humidity is also going to increase.

However, we're just on the edge of an intense heat wave that's hitting northern Maine, southern Quebec and New Brunswick with some mind-blowing temperatures.

To begin with, the temperature maps are inverted. It's hotter the further north you go on the East Coast. The hottest place anywhere in the United States yesterday east of the Mississippi River was the northern tip of Maine.

Caribou got up to 95 degrees, a record for the date.  Meanwhile, places like Atlanta, Georgia are still waiting for their first 90 degree day.

Some of the temperatures up in southeastern Canada were off the charts. At Sept Iles, way north along the north shore of the mouth of the St. Lawrence River, they experienced their all-time hottest temperature on record at 98 degrees.

Even further north, about 310 miles north of Montreal, Chibougamau, Quebec reached 91.5 degrees.

Jackson the weather dog sits in cool grass in the shade while
taking observations of 90-degree heat in St. Albans,
Vermont Thursday afternoon. 

In New Brunswick, Bathurst reached 99 degrees on Thursday.

The heat will continue in full force across southeastern Canada and northern Maine today. Heat warnings are up for much of Quebec, including metrol Montreal.  Caribou could have a high temperature of 97 degrees today, which would be the hottest reading there since at least 1939, when official records began.

Here in Vermont, it will be hot and humid through the weekend, but perhaps not as bad as points north. Most of the Green Mountain State can expect dailly hghs mostly between 85 and 90 degrees, probably through Tuesday.

There might be isolated thunderstorms, especially in the mountains, today through the weekend. Most of us will stay dry, though.  So drought or drought like conditions will likely keep building.

Snow Update, And Humdinger Severe Weather Risk In South

Snow accumulating this morning on this soon to be blooming daffodil
in my St. Albans, Vermont yard makes it look like an
elaborate but disgruntled bird. 

I woke up at dawn in St. Albans, Vermont this morning and was delighted to see it didn't snow overnight at my place.

That was short lived when I checked the radar and a swirl of moisture, in the form of a band of snow, was on my doorstep and heading toward me.  Sure enough, a half hour later, it was snowing.

At least at my place, the snow will only briefly accumulate for a few hours this morning, then melt, probably amounting to an inch or less. But we'll see.  

However, again, sure enough, forecasts were right. It appears several inches of snow fell across many towns in north central Vermont and the Northeast Kingdom. It was still snowing in these spots as of 7 a.m.

As April snowfalls go, this really isn't so unusual for Vermont. But until now, spring was running early, so it's a little disheartening to see the snow. In the valleys, most snow showers will change to, or at least mix with rain this afternoon.  By Saturday, the snow will be forgotten, except in parts of northern Vermont where there will still be some on the grouid.

Us Green Mountain Boys and Girls should thank our lucky stars that today's weather is merely unpleasant. And that the next storm coming along Sunday night and Monday looks merely inconvenient, and not super dangerous.

We can't say the same for Maine, which is buried in snow this morning, as expected. We also can't say the same for the Deep South, where ingredients are really coming together for a bunch of tornadoes on Easter Sunday. Some of those tornadoes could be biggies.

More on that in a moment, but first, Maine.

SNOWY MAINE MESS

Heavy snow and tree damage in Bangor, Maine this morning. Photo via
Twitter by Ben Sprague @bensprague. 

It was still snowing up there early this morning, but a lot of places already had more than a foot of snow.  Wellington, Maine reported 20 inches so far. Carmel, Maine, both towns in the north, by the way, had already picked up 18 inches of new snow.

Some places, especially in and near Baxter State Park, can expect more than two feet of snow by the time this tapers off. This is just an incredible storm, even by Maine standards.

Maine's heavy, wet snow has caused some terrible power failures, according to television station WMTW in Portland. More thank 200,000 homes and businesses in the state had no power this morning.  That's almost a third of Maine without power.

The coronavirus is hampering power restoration.  Utility workers are arriving at power outage sites separately, so they're not too close together, and they need to practice social distancing on site to reduce the risk of virus transmission. So yeah, it's complicated.

New power failures will surely develop as snow and gusty continue this morning. Fortunately, the snow will taper off later today.  The trouble going forward is that Monday storm I talked about will be warm in Maine. So warmth, melting snow and pretty heavy rain expected Monday is a bad combination if you don't want flooding.

SOUTHERN TORNADO ALERT

Ingredients definitely seem to be coming together for a nasty outbreak of tornadoes in the Deep South. If things develop as forecasters think they will (no guarantees, thankfully), this could be one of the worst, or the worst, tornado outbreaks of the year. We've already had a couple terrible ones, too.

The atmosphere in the Deep South Sunday will feature very humid air from the Gulf of Mexico near the surface. Strongs winds will scream a few thousand feet overhead, and those winds will change directions with height. The air will be highly unstable, making it easy for towering thunderstorm clouds to form.  Dry air coming in from the west high overhead would also help trigger storms.

NOAA's Storm Prediction Center says there's a real risk of strong, long lasting tornadoes in the Deep South on Easter Sunday, and people ought to be thinking now of where they would take shelter if a tornado is approaching.

Granted, this hopefully won't be as bad as the Super Outbreak of April 25-28, 2011, which hit mostly in the South. That outbreak spawned 362 tornadoes causing 321 deaths.  This weekend won't be nearly that bad, thank goodness, but bad enough.  Possibly very dangerous.

I suppose there could be an Easter miracle in which some storm ingredient gets fouled up and makes things not as bad as predicted. But that could be just wishful thinking. We'll see.

Two Destructive Storms Affecting U.S.; Some Effects Here In Vermont

Latest National Weather Service forecast snow map. Yellow and
orange areas, mostly in the Northeast Kingdom and high elevations
depict more than six inches of new snow. 

The storm that's going to sock Maine later today with a major snowstorm and us Vermonters with our share of rain and snow, has really packed a punch in other parts of the nation already.

Or at least the ingredients feeding into this storm have.

Tornadoes and severe thunderstorms swept large areas of the Midwest and South yesterday.  This was  part of the energy feeding into the storm, which I will call Storm #1.  That's because a Storm #2 will create its own big havoc Sunday and Monday. More on that in a bit.

One of yesterday's tornadoes passed very close to Jonesboro, Arkansas, which was hit by a destructive tornado on March 28.  Yesterday's tornado formed southwest of Jonesboro, which is bad because more often than not, twisters head toward the northeast.

This one went east and southeast, though, damaging or destroying more than two dozen homes around Harrisburg, Arkansas, which is a little south of Jonesboro.

Other possible tornadoes were scattered yesterday across the Midwest and South.

As the storm heads east to consolidate over New England, the system's cold front will probably set off more severe thunderstorms along the East Coast from the Carolinas to southern New England, with a zone from Washington DC to New York City being the best focus for damaging straight line winds.

The storm will rapidly organize into a big nor'easter along the coast of Maine tonight. The National Weather Service in Caribou, Maine is calling this an extremely impressive storm for mid-April. More than two feet of snow could smother Mount Katahdin, and many lowland areas in interior Maine could easily close in on 18 inches of heavy, wet snow. Snowfall rates in some parts of Maine tonight will go at two to three inches per hour, which is wild.

VERMONT EFFECTS

We'll get nothing like that here in Vermont, but it will still get unpleasant in a hurry today and stay that way at least through Friday.

The storm will start with a good slug of chilly rain, possibly starting out mixed with a few wet snowflakes in the high spots.

The rain will go over to snow this evening, first in the high elevations then going down to valley floors overnight in Vermont. Far northeastern Vermont is under a winter storm warning because six to 10 inches of wet snow is likely there through Friday.

Much of north central Vermont away from Lake Champlain  has got a winter weather advisory for two to six inches of snow.  The high peaks of the Green Mountains and Adirondacks could get six to 12 inches of snow, locally more out of this.

Even in the Champlain Valley, we'll wake up to a coating of snow Friday morning.

Friday is going to be a nasty day in Vermont by April standards. Snow showers will come down in many areas much of the morning, mixing with cold raindrops in the valleys as temperatures "warm" into the upper 30s.  Strong northwest winds will make it feel even more wintry.

It's still be chilly Saturday, but brighter. Sunday looks OK before the next storm hits which I will get into in a bit.

STORM #2

Forecasters are getting increasingly worried about what will become of a storm that's been meandering around southern California for days.

It'll finally eject into the southern Plains of the United States this weekend. Ingredients seem to be coming together or a big severe weather outbreak in the Deep South by Sunday.

Details are hard to tease out at this point, but the potential is at least there for strong, long lasting tornadoes from Louisiana to Florida.  This still might or might not happen, as a few factors could limit the severe weather. But at this point, things don't look good, and  people in the Deep South ought to be thinking about where they would go in a huge jiffy if these big tornadoes do develop. It's looking like a distinct possibility.

Storm #2 will turn into a strong system as it heads into the Great Lakes Monday.  Up here in Vermont, the early indications are we'll get a relatively mild day with a good chunk of wind and rain Monday, followed by an extended period of March-like temperatures following the storm.

Vermont To Get A Share Of Big Maine Snowstorm After All

National Weather Service in South Burlington is  upping
expected snow accumulations. Now 6-10 inches of snow expected
above 1,000 feet in northern Vermont, two to six inches
northern Vermont at elevations under 1,000 feet away from
Lake Champlain and dusting to two inches Champlain Valley. 

UPDATE, 3 PM WEDNESDAY

The snow forecast has been updated for the worse in parts of Vermont.

The winter storm watch that had been in effect for much of Maine and the northern tip of New Hampshire has now been extended westward to include northeast and north central Vermont.

Two to six inches of wet snow are now forecast between Thursday afternoon and Friday evening in the valleys of this region with six to 10 inches above 1,000 feet.

Travel will of course be hazardous and the wet snow could snap trees and power lines.

It now looks like there will be some light accumulations all the way down into the Champlain Valley, which is another change.  At this point, the Burlington area is expecting an inch-ish covering by Friday morning, with up to two inches near St. Albans.  Light mixed rain and snow will probably continue Friday in the valleys, with additiona snow in the higher elevations

Winter doesn't want to give up quite yet

PREVIOUS DISCUSSION:

Gawd, yesterday was a gorgeous spring day, especially in the northern half of Vermont. We enjoyed lots of sunshine, dry air, temperatures well up into the 50s and a bit of a pleasant breeze.

Daffodils in my yard are this close to blooming, and my lawn is rapidly turning green up here in St. Albans.

Time for a good slap of winter to get me and everybody else out of their spring stupor.

That dynamic storm system that will blow up into a powerful nor'easter near Maine turns out to have a few tricks up its sleeve for Vermont, it seems.

While the storm's wintry fury will focus on Maine and maybe northern New Hampshire, Vermont is in for some snow out of this, too. Not nearly as much as Maine will get, but still some for most of the state. Higher elevations could get quite a bit out of this.

Peaks in the northern Green Mountains could wind up with up to a foot of new snow by Friday evening.  Elevations above 1,500 feet are in for two to six inches of wet snow, says the National Weather Service in South Burlington.  Some of these spots could get more.

Little snow is expected in the Champlain and lower Connecticut River Valleys, but even there, Vermonters could well wake up to a slushy coating Friday morning.

THE SET UP

As the storm hits its early stages on approach to New England today, it'll help create a broad area of severe thunderstorms risks centered on the mid-Mississippi Valley. Huge hailstones are the biggest threats with these, along with strong winds. A tornado or two might also touch down in this region.

While we're waiting for the storm, today's weather will be OK. It'll get to near 50 degrees, and there will be a fair amount of sun, especially north. Enjoy it while it lasts.

The developing storm will have plenty of energy to work with as it crosses New England roughly from west to east Thursday. Here in Vermont, a cold rain will break out with this. But as the storm begings to consolidate along the coast the air above us will cool.

Precipitation will still be coming down at a good rate Thursday evening, and especially above 1,500 feet in elevation, rain will turn to wet snow.

This lovely white crocus now blooming in my St. Albans, Vermont
garden might get an unwelcome coating of more white from
possible snow Thursday night. 

Combined with gusty winds, the wet snow in mid and high elevations might be substantial enough to bring down some trees and power lines.

Thursday night, the storm will explode along the Maine coast, and that state is in for a literal blast. Much more than we Vermonters are in for.

Inland Maine could easily get up to a foot of wet, heavy snow out of this along with strong winds, so this will be really disruptive there.  Winter storm watches cover all of Maine except the coast.

The Maine coast doesn't escape the problem, though. There, high winds and coastal flooding are the major threats.

As the storm slowly grinds northeastward into the Canadian Maritimes Friday, moisture wrapping  around the back side of the storm will keep the snow going in the Green Mountains and Adirondacks, with several more inches of snow likely.

Even in the valleys up in the Northeast Kingdom, storm total snowfall looks like it could be around six inches, which is fairly impressive for mid-April.

This certainly won't be the worst Vermont April snowstorm on record. Not even close. On April 16-17, 1983, Burlington got more than 15 inches of wet snow, part of an April total that year of 21.3 inches. Burlington got 14.3 inches of snow on April 9, 2000. So you see it could be worse.

Another pretty strong looking storm looks like it might swing through Sunday night and Monday, but that one looks like it will produce mostly or exclusively rain around here.

Interesting Big Storms Around, But Vermont Mostly Spared

Powerful Tropical Cyclone Harold smashed into parts of Vanuatu
in the South Pacific Sunday and Monday 

The past day or so, and the forecast, calls for a few odd - and strong - storm systems both in the United States and elsewhere, especially in the South Pacific.

TROPICAL CYCLONE HAROLD

The nation of Vanuatu in the South Pacific comprises about 80 islands stretched out over 800 miles. Part of that island chain was hit by an immense hurricane named Tropical Cyclone Harold.

Hurricanes are called tropical cyclones in that part of the world and this was an extreme one.

Tropical storm Harold hit Vanuatu's largest island with winds estimated at 145 mph.  According to the Category 6 blog, the island has about 40,000 residents, mostly scattered in small villages across the island.

Harold had earlier killed 27 people in the Solomon Islands, the Weather Channel reports.

The coronavirus pandemic is going to complicate relief efforts in Vanuatu.  The island nation had not yet reported any cases of Covid-19, thanks in large part to restrictions at international borders and on tourism.

However, relief workers won't be allowed to come to Vanuatu to assist, unless they do a 14-day quarantine first, notes the Weather Channel. The economic and social toll of the pandemic will probably also interfere with relief efforts.

Harold is still out there, and is threatening the island nations of Fiji and Tongo.

BLIZZARDY MAINE?

A winter storm watch is up for western and central, and parts of northern Maine Thursday into Friday for what could be a doozy of a storm.

A storm system and cold front will move through New England Thursday, including here in Vermont.  The good dynamics with this storm will create plenty of showers, gusty winds, maybe a rumble of thunder and then some snow showers here in the Green Mountain State Thursday and Friday.

Once the storm gets to the Maine coast, Pow! It looks like it will blow up rapidly into a late blooming nor'easter.  Even the normally staid meteorologists at the National Weather Service in Caribou, Maine are wowed with the storm's potential.

"This is an impressive winter storm for any winter month, let along mid-April," they wrote in this morning's forecast discussion.

The storm will be pretty compact, at least at first, so the big storminess will focus mostly on Maine, New Brunswick, Nova Scotia, and the far southeastern corner of Quebec.

Maine and adjacent Quebec will be on the colder northwest side of the storm. Current forecasts call for a good seven to 10 inches of heavy, wet snow, along with strong winds. If that comes to pass, there will certainly be some nasty power outages in that neck of the woods.  Luckily the storm won't hang around for a long time, so conditions in Maine will start to improve later Friday.

Even so such a nasty winter storm is a bit of a shock to the system in April, even by Maine standards.

SOGGY S. CALIFORNIA

The winter rainy season in southern California is usually ending by now, but don't tell that to residents down there now. Flood watches are up for southern and southeasternn California, mostly south and east of Los Angeles.

A slow moving storm will dump heavy showers and thunderstorms, mainly in the usually dry deserts inland from the southern California coast. Those storms could easily cause some flash flooding.

Los Angeles got into the act yesterday with 1.22 inches of rain, the most for that date on record. It's a cold storm, so winter storm warnings are up for the mountains east of the city.

Forecasters are carefully watching what this storm does once it ejects out into the southern Plains of the United States toward Saturday.  If conditions come together right, the storm could produce a nasty tornado outbreak in the Southeast.

However, forecasting models are all over the place with this system, so nobody yet knows if the storm will turn into a monster or a nothing burger once it gets out into the south and middle of the nation.

Rare Tornado In Northeast Maine On Monday

A confirmed tornado in a remote part of Washington County, in
northeastern Maine on Monday. Photo by David Cofin.

Here in Vermont this past Monday, it was a gorgeous day, aside from some mild evening showers and thundershowers over far northern areas.

You didn't have to go to far to the northeast to get into some wild weather, though. A cold front was drifting down into northern New England from Quebec Monday afternoon and evening. Near Vermont, the dynamics weren't there to create anything in the way of strong storms.

But up in Maine, the cold front had some power to it.  Strong to severe thunderstorms swept across northern Maine, culminating in a tornado touchdown in remote Kossuth Township in the northeastern part of the state.

The EF-1 tornado was in an area not far from the New Brunswick border and southeast of Millinocket.  It was a small tornado, only 200 yards wide with a path length of a quarter mile. Estimated winds were 90 mph and about 120 softwood trees were snapped or uprooted.  Nobody was injured and no homes were damaged.

As you can see in the photo, a passerby named David Coffin got a great photo of the tornado.

Tornadoes do happen from time to time in Maine, as they do pretty much everywhere in the nation. This was the first confirmed tornado in Maine this year, the National Weather Service in Caribou says.

Maine averages two tornadoes per year.  Here in Vermont, we average one per year.  Maybe I'm jinxing things, but I'm not aware of any twisters in the Green Mountain State since at least 2014.

This Seems To Be A Great Winter For Really Cool Ice Disks

The huge, now famous ice disk in Westbrook, Maine. 

There's a cool phenomenon that sometimes happens in rivers and other waterways during the winter called "ice disks."

They've been in the news lately, too. There's been a huge one on the Presumpscot River in Westbrook, Maine.

This Maine ice disk might be the largest on record. In Michigan, another ice disc formed this week. There are a few reports of these every winter, but the Maine disk is, compared to most of the others, enormous.

I'll let EarthSky explain ice disks:

"It's actually a rather well-known natural phenomenon, usually found in spots where there is a circular current in a river or stream that creates a whirlpool effect. Random eddies in water tend to follow a circular route In winter, ice crystals in this slower-moving water can gradually coalesce to form a circular 'mat' of ice.

The current keeps the ice disk in place as it slowly rotates. As the disc turns, it bumps up against the shoreline or other chunks ofice and is essentially lathed down, until it is round. The result is an ice disk that can be surprisingly circular and smooth-edged."

Honestly, I think ice disks are the coolest, wildest thing winter weather has to offer. Video is at the bottom of this post to give you just a clue as to how neat they are.

The ice disc in Maine became something of an international celebrity this month. News outlets from as far away as Great Britain have done features on it. The Westbrook disc is probably one of the most spectacular examples of an ice disc in anyone's memory. It's about 300 feet wide, which is huge compared to most such disks.

The Westbrook ice disk was remarkably durable, surviving a deep freeze that would have stalled it. But a paddleboarder went out and freed it, so the disk started spinning again.  It also kept spinning through a heavy snowstorm. 

The ice disk even got its own web cam.

But there's always an idiot that comes out of the woodwork to ruin the party.

What was or is thought to be the apparent end to the Maine ice disk came Thursday when some moron went out on it to carve a peace sign into it, according to the Bangor Daily News. 

The idiot, Christopher Angulo from New Jersey, said "I'm making a giant peace sing out of this... And I want it to spin around so bad and create that visual for the world to see, of peace making the world go 'round right here in Westbrook."

So much for that idea.

The ice disk is still there, but at last check was not spinning and is definitely scarred by Angulo's antics.

Meanwhile, another, smaller  ice disk formed 200 miles north in Baxter State Park in Maine. Another disk has starting to get attention in Michigan. A spinning ice disk appeared earlier this week on the Cedar River in Gladwin, Michigan.

Ice disks are pretty rare, but there is a history of them in Vermont, too. Several years ago, an ice disk drew plenty of attention in central Vermont.

Here's a time lapse of the now-famous Maine ice disk. Judging by the number of people visible in this clip on a nearby parking garage roof, this really did turn into a big tourist attraction:

July Was Burlington, Vermont's Hottest Month On Record

The sprinklers were going frequently in my St. Albans, Vermont
garden in July as I, and my plants, endured the hottest month on record.

If you were saying to yourself in July, "I've never seen a month as hot as this one," you were absolutely right, at least if you were in Vermont, and some other areas of northern New England and southern Quebec.

Burlington, Vermont had an absolutely incredible month of July, capping it off by becoming the hottest month - any month - on record. These records date back to 1892.

A lot of records were tied or broken in Burlington. The ever-helpful National Weather Service office in South Burlington summarizes them for us:

Hottest Month: Mean temperature 76.0 besting the previous record of 75.3 in July, 1921
Hottest Maximums:  The average high temperature during July, 2018 was 87.4, beating the previous record of 86.5 degrees in July, 1949.
Most Days At Or Above 85 degrees in a month: 21 day in July, 2018, besting the old record of 20 such days in 1999, 1975 and 1955.
Most Days In a Month at 80 degrees or more: 29 such days in July, 2018, tying the record set in July, 1975.

Also, back on July 2, we had a minimum temperature for the day of 80 degrees, which is the highest minimum temperature for any date on record going back to 1892. And on June 30 through July 5, we tied the record for the second longest heat wave on record. Six straight days in the 90s.

HOT ELSEWHERE

Up in Caribou, Maine, normally an ice box, they had their hottest month on record, too. Their mean temperature for the month of July was 70.9 degrees, exceeding the previous record of 69.6 degrees in July, 1970.

The records are amazing, but of course they have real world effects. The heat early in the month killed at least four Vermonters and dozens in Quebec. July was drier than normal, but we didn't set any records for dryness. However, the extreme heat increased evaporation, so the ground dried out a lot more than it otherwise would have. You can actually see wilted, dead trees, killed by the dryness along Interstate 89 in Colchester, for instance.

If you thought it was hot in New England, and it certainly was, it was worse elsewhere. Death Valley, California just finished up the hottest month ever recorded anywhere in the United States. The mean temperature of 108 degrees (!!!) exceeded the record  of 107.4 degrees set just last year.

The many heat waves across the Northern Hemisphere seem to keep going. Record high temperatures were reported from Norway to Germany this week. A new heat wave developing in Portugal, Spain and France could bring all time European record high temperatures in the coming days.

It's true it's cool in some parts of the world -  parts of far northern Canada had a cool July and parts of the upper Midwest weren't super hot in July. However, all these heat waves do seem to overwhelm things. To me, a likely sign of global warming, climate change, whatever you want to call it.

HOT NEW ENGLAND OUTLOOK

Back here in Vermont, there's no rest for the heat weary. It's going to remain very warm and humid at least through next Tuesday, I'm afraid.

A warm front is trying to work its way up from the south today, which will set off scattered showers and thunderstorms. A few storms, especially south, and out towards New York's St. Lawrence Valley, might be strong this afternoon.

We still need the rain, so let's hope non-severe showers are widespread tonight. We'll see.

That warm front will make it even more humid going forward over the next few days. Daily highs will be in the 80s, with some 90s possibly showing up Thursday, and especially this coming Sunday and Monday.

There will be some hit and miss showers and storms scattered about through most of this period, but especially going into the weekend, I think the rain will be more miss than hit.

For those of you sick of the heat, I know there's no immediate relief in the forecast, but consider this: We're past the peak of summer. During August, normal temperatures in Vermont begin a slow decline. Maybe the heat will begin to wane later this month.

As Expected, Nor'easter Blasts East, Vermont In For Long Haul Snow

Satellite image this morning of the third
beastly nor'easter in three weeks
here in New England

As of 8 a.m. this morning, things were going downhill quickly in eastern New England, as expected, with the latest big nor'easter behaving pretty much as expected.  

It started out as rain early this morning in southeastern New England, but now the temperature has dropped, the wind has picked up and snow has the snow.

The snow down there is wet and heavy, at least for now, so they can expect more big time power failures. There were already reports of up to 40,000 power outages in Massachusetts as of 8:30 a.m.

As the snow intensifies in eastern New England, nobody should be out driving.

Once again, the coastline is taking a beating. This morning's high tide will bring more flooding to places like Scituate and Plymouth. It looks like the ocean side of Cape Cod, Nantucket Harbor and the east side of Nantucket are going to be hit hard.

There's already been incredible beach erosion on the east side of Cape Cod and Nantucket from the previous two big nor'easters. This is just going to make matters much worse. Massachusetts is literally smaller in area than it was back in February.

The snow was just beginning to move up into New Hampshire and Maine as of 8 a.m. this morning.

All of eastern New England from Rhode Island to Maine can expect 12 to 18 inches of snow out of this, with local amounts to two feet. The snow will come down at a rate of one to three inches per hour at times with this.

As this photo shows, heavy, wet snow was already affecting
trees and power lines in eastern Massachusetts, and the worst
of the storm was only just arriving. 

Winds gusting to 60 mph along the coast and the heavy snow have meant the blizzard warnings remain in effect along the immediate Massachusetts, New Hampshire and Maine coasts, including the cities of Boston, Portsmouth, New Hampshire and Portland, Maine.

Gusts of 65 mph have already been reported in Edgartown, Massachusetts

I'm sure they're getting tired of this repeated rinse and repeat destruction cycles along the coast and in the big cities of southern New England.

HERE IN VERMONT

Yep, it's snowing again. As expected, the snow won't come down hard for most of this, but it will keep snowing, and snowing, and snowing, and it will eventually add up.

In far southern Vermont, bands of heavier snow from the main nor'easter look like they might reach that area.

That's bad for the higher elevations of the southern Green Mountains, which have been thumped by both of the past nor'easters with one to three feet of new snow each time. Another foot or more could come down with this one.

Car crashes were already closing roads in Massachusetts
early this morning. 

For the rest of us, especially in northern Vermont, some areas will probably close in on a foot of new snow as well, but it will take until Wednesday night or Thursday to get there.

We're on the western edge of the nor'easter, so steady light snow today will accumulate to about two to four inches today.

Then, another two to five inches comes down tonight, then probably many areas will get two to four inches more on Wednesday as the storm spins around northeast of us. So you can see how that adds up to six to 12 inches.

More snow, especially in the northern mountains, will continue Wednesday night and Thursday, with additional accumulations.

Also, I hope you like snow. The trend will be toward colder temperatures, so there won't be any real thawing to speak of through at least next Monday, and probably beyond that. And, guess what? There's the possibility - only the possibility at this point - of another nor'easter sometime next week.

More Random Notes From Weekend's Wild New England Weather

Map shows all the tornado warnings issued by the
National Weather Service office in Gray, Maine Saturday.

As we enjoy a gorgeous stretch of weather today through Wednesday - quite a bit of sun, cool temperatures, low humidity - some of us are still cleaning up from the wild weather we had in northern New York and northern New England.

Here's a few random items:

The National Weather Service in Gray, Maine issued seven different tornado warnings on Saturday. Before this, the most tornado warnings that NWS office had ever issued in an entire year was six.

At least three tornadoes were confirmed in Maine.

In Campton, New Hampshire, campers did not heed flood warnings and had to be rescued, says the Manchester Union Leader. Fifty or so campers were rescued, and two people and a dog were stranded atop a picnic table until 2 a.m.  Sunday,

In New York state, severe flooding struck Utica and Hoosic Falls, and a tornado was confirmed Friday in Broadalbin, New York.

In Vermont, several businesses around Hartford were damaged by flooding and mudslides, and an 800 foot section of railroad track shifted as saturated ground slid downhill. Amtrak passengers are being bussed around the area for now.

About a half dozen Vermont state highways were damaged, and towns are being asked to assess damage to see if the state can qualify for federal funding to help recover from the flooding.

Wild Saturday Hits New England With Floods, Tornadoes; Much Quieter Today

Large waterspout on Sebago Lake, Maine Saturday. 

As expected, it was quite the wild day across northern New England with lots of flash flooding, thunderstorm wind damage and even a couple of tornadoes.

At least two tornadoes, possibly more, struck western Maine. There were dramatic photos and videos of Sebago Lake, Maine, where a large waterspout moved through.

There was other damage in western Maine due to possible tornadoes.

Here in Vermont, there was some thunderstorm wind damage in the southern third of the state.

Radar indicated strong rotation with a severe storm over Danby, Vermont, and a filmmaker caught rotating clouds over Wilder, Vermont, but there were no reports of any tornado touchdowns in the Green Mountain State.

But the main story was the flash flooding across the central part of Vermont.

A large tree floating down the swollen Mad River in Waitsfield pierced the side of an historic covered bridge in the middle of town, and so that's closed until they can figure out how bad the damage is and when they can repair it.

Several roads closed in Vermont due to flooding, especially in and around Barre and in Addison County. Most - but not all - had reopened by 8 a.m. Sunday.

Far northern Vermont, which had looked to be under the gun for flash flooding on Saturday, escaped trouble with only mostly light rain reported there.

Things are finally calming down region wide.

Mad River running very high in Warren, Vermont
late Saturday afternoon 

There's still a flood warning on the lower Winooski River from around Waterbury to Lake Champlain today as the runoff from rains makes its way downstream.

We're about to enter a very welcome period of quite calm weather.

The only weather system of note will come through probably on Thursday, but at this point that one doesn't look like it will be that big a deal.

It will be on the cool side for July for at least a week. After near seasonable temperatures today - near 80 degrees, it will be in the 70s daily for the rest of the week. There will also be a fair amount of sunshine to dry us out as well.

Which I'm sure we'll all enjoy.

Big Snow Totals From Departing Storm, E. New England Still In Trouble

My driveway in St. Albans, Vermont was only partly dug out
and I still had to dig out my truck after the latest storm
dumped 13 inches of snow on my property. 

Thank goodness I shoveled the first half of this snowstorm out of my St. Albans, Vermont driveway last evening.

Had I not, I would have struggled with a bit more than a foot of new snow, instead of the five or so inches that accumulated after I shoveled.

As of 6:20 a.m, my house at St. Albans had 12.9 inches of new snow from the storm, and it was still snowing lightly.

That's a little more than I expected, and I imagine we'll hear of several reports across Vermont of close to or even more than a foot and a half.

Snowfall reports are only widely scattered as I write this, and more extensive snow total reports will come in later this morning. However, there are several reports of around a foot of snow in northwestern Vermont, like in Franklin County and Grand Isle.

There are reports of at least a foot of new snow coming in from central Vermont, too.

At last report the National Weather Service office reported 10.6 inches of new snow.

It looks like an upper level low pressure system, moving across Vermont last night as an ingredient to create the big nor'easter now off the New England coast, contributed to the relatively high snow totals.

It won't snow much more today in Vermont, with most places getting no more than one to three inches of additional accumulation, especially this morning.

Winds weren't particularly strong as of 6 a.m today, but they will pick up dramatically this morning and gust over 30 mph, so we're still in for a lot of blowing and drifitng snow.

Roads were already snow covered and slippery this morning, and will remain so with all that blowing snow today. Expect a slow commute to work this morning in most sections of Vermont.  A huge number of schools in Vermont are closed today, or at least have delayed openings. Check your local listings.

While it's practically all over but the crying and the shoveling in Vermont, parts of eastern New England are still in big trouble with this nor'easter.

Across eastern Massachusetts, wet snow clinging to trees combined with strong winds have caused widespread power failures there. It's going to get worse today as winds will get even stronger - up to 55 mph during the day today. 

The nor'easter is generating huge ocean waves, and gale force northwest winds will plow ocean water into the shores of eastern Massachucetts, especially north facing shores on Cape Cod.

During the high tide early this afternoon, forecasters warn of extensive flooding, possible structural damage to homes and evacuations. 

Meanwhile, a full scale blizzard continues to rage today in Downeast Maine and parts of Atlantic Canada, especially Nova Scotia.

So count yourself lucky, Vermonters.

Aside from today's wind, we'll have good shoveling weather, as it won't be all that cold, with highs in the 20s. Tuesday will be an excellent day for continued clean up with some sun, temperatures again well into the 20s and - Bonus! light winds.

THAT STORM ON WEDNESDAY

At this point, it looks like the new snowfall on Wednesday won't be all that extreme, especially the further west you go in New England, i.e. Vermont.

A storm system from the west will cross the state and drop a few inches of snow, as it looks now. Like in the past two episodes, the system coming in from the west will probably trigger a strong nor'easter off the New England coast.

However, this time, the nor'easter will be further east than the previous two, so that its effects on New  England will be less.

After the mid-week episode, we're going to go into a temporarily quieter weather pattern for a few days with little if any storminess next weekend and temperatures starting to get above normal again.

Snow Forecast A Semi-Bust In Vermont; Maine Buried

The Maine Turnpike looked dicey last night. 

Well, that didn't end perfectly, from a forecaster's point of view.

Yep, less snow in Vermont that you might have seen in forecasts ahead of the storm, that's for sure.

The European computer model was more right than many forecasters thought. (I hedged my bets on it too).

The big storm tracked a bit further east  and less snow fell in Vermont than a lot of people anticipated.

It was still snowing in many areas of northern Vermont early this morning,and snowfall totals will come closer to predictions.

I'll get to an attempt as to what will happen next with the weather further down. First, we'll recap what we know about what happened with this storm so far.

As of 11:30 last night, the most snow I'd see was 10 inches in Springfield and 7.8 inches in Williamstown.  I'm sure we'll get some slightly higher totals in later updates today.

To be fair to the National Weather Service in South Burlington, Vermont, they knew how uncertain this storm was right to the end when it started blowing in.

They put out three sets of forecast maps, one showing what they thought would be the least impacts in Vermont, another showing about what they thought might happen, and a third showing a worst case scenario.

It appears we got more snow than the least impacts map, but not quite as much as the middle of the road one, which was the one forecasters hedged their bets on. 

New Hampshire, thought to be in the bullseye of this storm, got less snow than anticipated, too. The most I've seen so far in the Granite State is 15 inches in Wakefield, with numerous reports of around a foot.

Western and southern Maine got  totally buried with this. They got NAILED. Thundersnow spread up from Massachusetts into Maine and the results were incredible.

Hollis, Maine got 5.8 inches in just one hour during thundersnow. Oxford, Maine had a total of 20 inches of new snow, including 3.8 inches within an hour.

A burst of heavier snow in Stowe, Vermont Thursday
Via Instagram/Universityepicphoto

So far, the most I've seen in Maine is 25.6 inches in North Waterford and 25 inches in Limerick. Many places in southwestern Maine got 20 or more inches of snow. 

Summing the incredible Maine snowfall rates up, Mike Dross had just about one of the best weather tweets I've ever read: "Atmosphere is projectile vomiting hexagonal shaped ice tonight in Maine."

WHAT'S NEXT

The now intense storm is heading into the Canadian Maritimes. It was still snowing pretty hard in northern Maine early this morning but that will taper off.

As expected, northwest winds around the backside of the storm is bringing moist air into the North Country. As the wet air rises up and over the Green Mountains, it'll wring out a few more inches of snow today over the ski resorts and western slopes.

Expect another two to four inches there, and a couple additional inches maybe in the Northeast Kingdom.

In the Champlain Valley,  the most you'll see is just a few flurries.

Usually, it gets very cold after a nor'easter goes by, but there was just not a good supply of cold air up in Quebec to swoop down on us.

So it'll be mild-ish for this time of year, with daytime highs in the 20s to near 30 and lows tonight just in the teens to around 20. Not bad.

We're still expecting a weak storm New Year's Eve to filter some light snow down on First Night celebrations. It won't amount to much, but will slicken roads somewhat Saturday night. I'm a bit worried about the mix of slick roads and drunken drivers.

(As is my custom, I'll be home early New Year's Eve and watch 2017 arrive from the safety of my own home.)

Unfortunately for winter sports enthusiasts, the next storm coming along Tuesday still looks as if it will be a mix to rain scenario.

Ghosts Of Pacific Hurricane Blasted Canada, Carolinas, Maine, Malta, Sicily.....

A severe "Medicane" storm in the Mediteranean Sea
this week distantly had a bit of its origins
in a Pacific Ocean hurricane.  

During the third wee in October,  a hurricane named Ana threatened Hawaii.  Turns out it didn't actually make landfall there, but it did give them a scare, along with some high surf, gusty winds and some heavy rain.

Ana then fell apart, and its remnants moved across the Pacific Ocean. The Ana remnants combined with other weather systems to cause a nasty storm with wind gusts to hurricane force in British Columbia, Canada  around October 28.

That British Columbia storm, partly the remains of Ana, then combined with other weather systems to produce that epic storm in the eastern United States last weekend.

That's the one that caused the record early snowfall in the Carolinas, and then blasted northern Maine with up to 21 inches of early season snow.

The ghosts of Ana continue to haunt. Energy from the nor'easter that hammered the Carolinas and Maine went across the Atlantic Ocean, where it helped spin up a nasty storm in the Mediterranean Sea late this week.

A snowstorm in Bangor, Maine last weekend left this damage
A bit of the storm had its origins as a hurricane in the Pacific
Ocean. The nor'easter that brought this snow helped
contribute to a subsequent severe storm in the Mediterrannean.  

According to Dr. Jeff' Master's weather blog, the storm in the Mediterranean was dubbed a "medicane" because it acquired characteristics of a tropical storm or hurricane.

The "medicane" wasn't a true hurricane as it had a blend of elements of a tropical system and that of a regular storm system.

It was a nasty storm though, causing terrible flooding in Malta, and sustained winds on the island of 47 mph gusting to 66 mph. Other weather stations on Malta reported gusts of over 90 mph.

Still, it's amazing to see that the ghosts and traces of a hurricane near Hawaii subsequently helped lead to very troublesome storms in such disparate places as British Columbia, South Carolina, Maine, Malta, and at last report, Sicily.

I wonder if the ghosts of Ana will cause trouble anywhere else. Who knows? Maybe it'll be Hawaii's turn again.  I really, really strongly doubt that would happen, but wouldn't it be wild if it did?

Wacky Jet Stream Partly to Blame for Carolina, Maine Snows And Other Recent Weather Weirdness.

The scene in Bangor, Maine this morning. And
this is before the worst of the storm arrived.  

Every so often, the weather really goes off the rails, and this weekend is one of those times.

You might have seen all the news about the snow in the Carolinas yesterday.  It was the earliest in the season they'd seen such snowy weather.

Today, Maine is getting an epic snowstorm, with up to a foot of snow and gusts to 55 mph expected. This is something that normally doesn't hit until December. And even by December standards this storm is really something up there.

The cause of all this big weather in the northern hemisphere is, of course, the jet stream. We can always blame the jet stream for big weather.

It usually has a wavy, curvy path, trending northward in one part of the world, then turning a corner and sliding southward, only to head north again downstream.

You start getting into problems with the jet streams curves, those northward and southward excursions, when they get really intense, going way, way north, then way, way south and so on.

This is called an "amplified" pattern.  Think of it this way: When sound is amplified, it's loud. When the jet stream pattern is amplified, that means the weather is loud.

So you get we had in the United States and elsewhere in the world this week. The amplified jet stream was able to grab a strong weather disturbance from way up near the Arctic, and slam it down way south into the Carolinas.

Amazingly, this is not Buffalo, New York in January
but Gilbert, South Carolina yesterday, November 1.
Photo by Tom Dominick of The State newspaper.  

That's why it snowed there. Had the jet stream not been so extreme, not so amplified, and more normal, there would probably have been a run of the mill cool spell near the Great Lakes and into the Northeast.

And if anything happened in the Carolinas, it would have been a normal autumn rainfall.

That amplified jet stream then curves way, way north off the East Coast, and that is, in part, why there's such a strong storm hitting Maine today.

Elsewhere in the northern hemisphere, the jet stream is also pretty amplified. It's contributing to a strange week of weather in Europe, including record late season warmth from Finland to Britain,
a very odd, extreme early season ice storm in Bulgaria, and a reported damaging tornado today in Leicestershire, England. 

There's no rest for the weary, either. It looks like some fairly strong storm systems will keep crossing the nation over the next two weeks. Long range forecasts are notoriously dicey, so I can't really give you details on how those storms over the next couple of weeks will play out.

We also have the inevitable question about this amplified jet stream I've been talking about: Does it have anything to do with global warming?

The answer is: Maybe.

The theory is that since the Arctic is warming faster than places near the Equator, the temperature difference between the tropics and the Arctic isn't as great as it once was. A well-behaved jet stream depends on this contrast of temperatures between the North and the South.

If the contrast isn't as great as it once was, that means the jet stream has more room to get "wavy" or amplified, so as the planet warms, we get more extreme weather.

Scientists still disagree on whether this aspect of climate change is real.  The consensus, by my reading, seems to be that global warming is influencing the jet stream, but so are other things. The bottom line is this particular aspect of the science is not well understood. It needs more work.

There's studies going on to determine if this potential effect of climate change, the wacky jet stream, is actually happening, or just a false lead or illusion.

Stay tuned on that one. Meanwhile, enjoy the big storms. Or at least try to.

Update: Scenes From A Record Early Southern Snow. And Maine's Still Screwed.

Snow on palm trees in Lexington, SC
Saturday. Photo by Lisa Grise via Twitter.

Today was an incredible day in the Carolinas.  

They had their first snow of the season, and in many cases, it broke the record for earliest snowfall by many days or even a couple weeks.

More incredibly, some areas got several inches of snow. A few places in the higher elevations were closing in on two feet as of late Saturday afternoon.

Up to 22 inches of snow as reported near the North Carolina/Tennessee border. Columbia and Greenville, South Carolina had by far their earliest snowfall on record.

This is one of the most extreme, bizarre storms I've ever seen.

The snow around Greenville and Columbia is particularly incredible because the South Carolina cities are at low elevations. It's only snowed a couple times in those cities in November since the 1880s, and those cases were much later in the month.

Both of these South Carolina cities had their first snowfall of the winter earlier than cold northern wintry cities as Bismarck, North Dakota, Buffalo, New York and Burlington, Vermont.

Snow and foliage in the southeastern U.S.
Photo by Ted Overbay via Twitter

This storm isn't done. The snow in the Carolinas was caused by an incredibly strong upper level disturbance that dove due south from the Arctic, through the Great Lakes and into the Carolinas.

On it's way through the Great Lakes, the disturbance unleashed very strong winds on Chicago, causing high waves and flooding along the shores of Lake Michigan.

The strong upper level disturbance had so much cold air with it, and and so much energy, that it dropped temperatures to near record low levels.

The heavy precipitation with the disturbance further cooled the air, and the result was snow.

As a strong weather disturbance that was an
ingredient for today's southern snow passed
Chicago Friday, it stirred up big waves
on Lake Michigan. Photo by Nick Ulivieri via Twitter

The upper disturbance finally made it to the coast northeast of Myrtle Beach, South Carolina at mid afternoon Saturday. Interactions with another, southern disturbance, and the warm waters of the Gulf Stream are making a nor'easter develop explosively.

A bomb is what we call these things, since they get going so fast and so extensively.

This "bomb" will move north, meaning New England is screwed. At least parts of New England, anyway.

As I said this morning, we're lucky the storm is tracking quite a ways offshore, so the worst effects will miss much of New England.

Still, a high wind warning is still up for Cape Cod and the islands. Coastal flood warnings are up along much of the New England coast, too. especially on north facing beaches where the strong winds will push ocean water ashore.

Harlan County, Kentucky on Saturday.
Photo by Debra Callahan via Twitter.  

The big part of this storm still looks to hit the eastern half of Maine. The storm is going to move more north, rather than northeast, once it gets past Cape Cod, so it will really affect that part of Maine.

Up to 14 inches of snow is likely to fall there, and it could drift quite a bit as winds will gust over 40 mph.

Very heavy snow, a foot or more in some areas, will hit parts of New Brunswick, Canada Sunday.

Inland areas of the Northeast, including western New England and northern New York, are in for a blustery Sunday, with some snow flurries, especially early in the day.

It was already snowing steadily in some mountainous areas of Vermont Saturday afternoon, but accumulations will generally be less than 3 inches in the mountains, and no more than a dusting in the valleys.

At my house at a low elevation St. Albans, near Lake Champlain in northwestern Vermont, I was treated to the joy of doing yard work this afternoon in a drizzle that was mixed with bits of sleet and slush. Yummy!

I still think the weather in the eastern United States will settle down this week and become much more seasonable. However, frequent rain showers will probably affect much of the Northeast.

However, the weather pattern remains dynamic, and there's still a greater than usual chance that other strong storms could hit hit the Northeast between November 5 and 15. That's no guarantee, of course, but it's something to watch.