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.

Wild, Icy Optical Effects In New Hampshire Wows Meteorologists, Sky Watchers

This photo by Alex Kotzias, taken from a New Hampshire
ski lift recently shows at least nine really cool sky
and light effects caused by ice crystals. To have so
many effects at once is extremely rare.

Interesting things can happen in the sky when it's cold and snowy and ice crystals dance in the atmosphere like countless tiny diamonds.

Such was the case recently around Franconia, New Hampshire when ice crystals and sunshine combined to create some surreal optical effects. Hat tip to "Scoop" Cronin for alerting me to all this.

Some of these effects in the sky are common, some are pretty rare. And it's almost unheard of to have nine - count them, nine - of these effects going on in the skyh at once.

The Washington Post Capital Weather Gang took note of this and the reporters involved couldn't believe the great photos. Neither can I. They got one photo from a New Hampshire Department of Transportation worker who caught a photo of the remarkable sky, but "only" captured seven of the atmospheric events.

Capital Weather Gang ran a story about it, and the original photo was topped by another, taken by Alex Kotzias as he road a chairlift at Cannon Mountain Ski Area.  All of the odd things in the sky depend upon the presence of ice crystals.

A common but beautiful phenomenon in the photos is a halo which is a multi-colored band forming a 22 arc around the sun.

Then there's a parhelic circle, which the Capital Weather Gang describes as a monochromatic Hula-Hoop piercing the sun itself. These thigs form at the same height in the sky as the sun itself.

Where the parhelic circle and the 22 degree arc of the halo intersect, that's where you get a sun dog, which is a brighter spot of light. They sort of look like small companions of the sun. Kind of like a dog next to its human companion.

The light show elements described above are fairly common, but other things in the photo are not. One is called a Parry arc and the other is an upper tangent arc, both located above the location of the sun.

Another photo from New Hampshire shows seven of the effects
caused by ice crystals. Capital Weather Gang labeled
them for us. 

Parry arcs were first observed during William Edward Parry's naval search for a Northwest Passage in the Arctic on April 8 1820. Accompanying the Parry arc in the photos is an upper tangent arc. The Capital Weather Gang says both of these flatten out as the day progresses, and eventually merge.

Above these two things are a superlateral arc and a circumzenithal arc, which are above the Parry and upper tanget arcs. The superlateral arc curves down, while the circumzenithal arc looks like a bowl.

On top of everything else, the photo from the ski lift shows diamond dust. Those are little white specks which are ice crystals closer to the photographer.

The photos from New Hampshire are filled out by two more common light displays. A shaft of light called a sun pillar extends directly upward from the sun. Clouds low to the horizon cast bands of shadows from the sunlight. These bands of shadows and light are called crepsuscular rays.

I'll never remember the names of most of the things Capital Weather Gang describes and neither will you. The important thing is how cool and beautiful all these are. It's a good reminder to look toward our rare bursts of sun in our dark winters to see some really gorgeous stuff created by something as simple as ice crystals.

I've noticed all of these things described with the sun except for the Perry arc and upper tangent arc numerous times. But mostly you see only a couple of these at a time. To have nine in one photograph is just stunning.  Wish I was in Franconia, New Hampshire that day.

Flash Flooding, Other Storms Continue To Plague Nation

Good Samaritans rescue a 70 year old man from a flooded car in
Rockford, Illinois Monday.

Flash flooding is turning into a big problem in many different parts of the nation this week. Other storms have produced big hail and even a couple New Hampshire tornadoes.

I mentioned the Houghton, Michigan flood the other day. Other hard hit areas include Rockford, Illinois.

Many homes and businesses, including a hospital, were flooded there, and motorist were rescued from stranded cars. Three to five inches of rain fell in Rockford in just a few hours.

Parts of Texas, such as Port Arthur, hit so hard by Hurricane Harvey flooding last year, went under water again.

Snow plows clear heavy accumulations of hail from a highway
in Colorado this week. 

Today, the greatest risk of additional flooding includes coastal Texas and Louisiana, and an area around southeastern South Dakota and Iowa. (I hope the sump pumps are working great in my mother-in-law's house in Yankton, South Dakota!)

Meanwhile, the problem in Colorado was hail, especially in Greeley, Boulder and the Denver suburb of Aurora.

Some of the hailstones were the size of tennis balls, so you can imagine how many cars and roofs were damaged in these heavily populated areas.

Finally, we talked yesterday about those tornado warnings Monday in New Hampshire and Massachusetts.  

It turns out two tornadoes were confirmed in New Hampshire. A hiker in the White Mountains took a photo of a weak tornado skipping across the hills and forests around Lincoln, New Hampshire. Another tornado, and EFO with 75 mph winds, took a nine mile path near Bath, New Hampshire.

Here's some videos:

First,  a rescue from a flooded car in Rockford, Illinois:



Here water in Rockford gushes into a hospital:



Here's an intense hail storm in Greeley, Colorado:



In Greeley, hail washed into a low spot in one neighborhood and ended up being two to three feet deep, as this news clip shows:

Trump And The Tornado Warning, New Hampshire Twister, More Severe Stuff Today

People at Dulles Airport in Virginia, near Washington DC, were ordered
into an underground train tunnel during a tornado warning Monday. No
tornado struck the airport, but a severe thunderstorm did.

UPDATE: 1 p.m. TUESDAY

A tornado watch  has been issued for a good chunk of the northeastern United States, including the southern two counties in Vermont

This is the second time within half a month in which at least part of Vermont has been under a tornado watch. That's a pretty unusual situation.

I still think the biggest threat from the severe storms will be strong straight line winds and hail.

Tornadoes are certainly possible in the tornado watch area, though. Tornado warnings were already appearing in northeastern Pennsylvania as of early afternoon. I think the greatest threat for tornadoes are in New York's Hudson Valley from Albany to just north of New York City. Also, western Massachusetts and western Connecticut have a decent threat of a tornado or two.

Already, isolated thunderstorms ahead of the main band were firing in eastern New York and headed toward New England. The ones out ahead of the main band have the biggest threat of firing up tornadoes, but the main band could produce a couple, too.

The storms will probably congeal into a nasty squall line later with a terrible wind threat, with gusts to 80 mph possible in spots.

Further north in Vermont, we needed the rain and it was heavier than expected this morning, which is a good thing. There's still a threat of some thunderstorms in central Vermont today, but I don't think they will be severe.

Rain will taper off in the north later today.

PREVIOUS DISCUSSION:

A band of severe thunderstorms roared through parts of the Middle Atlantic states Monday (and in many areas in the central Plains) prompting a variety of severe weather alerts and causing a number of reports of damage. 

President Trump even got caught up in the middle of it.

TRUMP MOTORCADE BLASTED

Trump had visited his wife, Melania in the hospital and was headed back to the White House when the storms hit. He probably shouldn't have been out there, as part of his motorcade route took him through a zone that was under a tornado warning. 

I'm not sure why the Secret Service didn't make Trump wait it out at the hospital or some other sturdy building. So far, there are no reports that a tornado actually touched down, but the motorcade was battered by high winds, torrential rains and street flooding.

NEW HAMPSHIRE TORNADO

Apparent tornado damage in Warner, New Hampshire on May 4.

In other news, it turns out a long-tracked tornado struck New Hampshire on May 4.

You remember that Friday, when Vermont was under a tornado watch and New Hampshire was under a severe thunderstorm watch.

Vermont had lots and lots of severe thunderstorms that day, but no reports of tornadoes. It was New Hampshire that got it. (Vermont almost did with this one.)

The National Weather Service office in Gray, Maine said the tornado touched down in Charlestown, New Hampshire, which is just across the Connecticut River from Springfield and Rockingham, Vermont.

The twister traveled 35 miles in an east-northeasterly direction to the town of Webster. That's an awfully long tracked tornado, especially for New Hampshire. Most tornadoes, especially in New England, are on the ground for a only a few miles at most. This tornado caused the most damage in Warner, New Hampshire, where winds associated with the storm were estimated at up to 100 mph.

It was also the second earliest date in the year that a tornado has struck New Hampshire.

The tornado was an EF1. The National Weather Service will release a more detailed report on the twister today

NEW ENGLAND SEVERE WEATHER TODAY

There's a risk of severe thunderstorms today, especially in the
yellow and orange areas of this map. 

Today, there's actually the slight risk of a tornado again today, this time in southwestern New England, the lower Hudson Valley of New York and parts of northeastern Pennsylvania.

A cold front was approaching New England this morning.

Up here in northern Vermont, the clouds and rain will arrive before the air can destabilize, so just expect a bunch of needed showers, with maybe a rumble of thunder this morning and the first half of the afternoon

Once you get into southern Vermont, there could easily be some more rambuctious thunderstorms, with lightning and downpours, but I don't think the storms will be severe, except maybe near the Massachusetts border.

But the places I mentioned above will get some sunshine ahead of the cold front to destabilize the air. A weather disturbance approaching from the west in tandem with the cold front will act to stir the pot even more.

So there's a good chance of severe storms in cities like Danbury and Hartford, Connecticut, Springfield, Massachusetts and Scranton, Pennsylvania. There's a slightly lesser but still real chance o severe storms in the New York City metro area and parts of heavily populated New Jersey, eastern Pennsylvania and Maryland

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.

Rare Dual June Tropical Storms And East Coast Storm Cleanup

Summer time is often the doldrums when it comes to weather.

This big mess of a storm in the Gulf of Mexico is likely to
become Tropical or Subtropical Storm Cindy.

It's hot and humid and nothing much happens. Oh sure, you get your occasional severe thunderstorms, a few searing heat waves, maybe a local flood or two.

But things so far in this young summer are coming fast and furiously.

I've already mentioned a couple days ago that terrible heat wave in the Southwest, where all time record high temperatures are being threatened today.

The Northeast today is cleaning up after punishing thunderstorms and flash floods on Monday. I'll have more on that in a bit.

JUNE TROPICAL STORMS

But first, we have the rare spectacle of two Atlantic tropical storms spinning up at the same time. It's the first time that's happened in June since 1968.

That is, if a near-tropical storm in the Gulf of Mexico gets its act together today.

Tropical Storm Bret spun up in the far southern Caribbean yesterday, slashing Trinidad and Tobago and the northern coast of Venezuela with gusty winds and torrential rains.

It's heading toward the west with top sustained winds of 45 mph. It probably won't get much stronger, and forecasters think Bret will fall apart in a couple days. Stronger upper level winds will probably kill Bret before it reaches the coast of Nicaragua.

A bigger worry, at least for us in the United States, is a tropical storm or subtropical storm is  expected to develop in the Gulf of Mexico, possibly today. (A subtropical storm has characteristics of both a tropical storm and a regular old low pressure system.)

The Gulf of Mexico storm has winds of 40 mph, enough to have it declared a tropical storm. However, as of early this morning, it didn't have a nice circular center, which you need to have a tropical storm.

The storm was getting better organized, so the National Hurricane Center gave this storm a 90 percent chance of becoming Tropical Storm Cindy.

Forecasters are worried about wannabe Cindy because it's heading north toward the United States Gulf Coast. Tropical storm warnings are up for the Louisiana coast, and a tropical storm watch is up for the far eastern Texas coastline.

Storm surges in the low lying coasts could definitely cause flooding with this.

A bigger worry is the torrential rains that will come in with Wannabe Cindy. At this point, the storm poses an inland flood threat from East Texas and Louisiana all the way up to Tennessee and Kentucky, and possible east of that in the coming days.

EAST COAST STORMS

As expected, lots of strong and severe thunderstorms popped up in the Northeast Monday, sending plenty of trees and powerlines crashing down, sometimes onto cars and houses. Flash flooding became a real problem, especially in parts of southern Vermont and New Hampshire.

Only one tornado was reported so far, an EF-0 with 70 mph winds that trashed some trees in Maryland.

Departing storm clouds cast an orange glow at sunset last
evening in St. Albans, Vermont.

Here in Vermont, flooding was pretty widespread in and around Brattleboro. A large mudslide closed Route 30 northwest of Brattleboro. The Brattleboro Reformer also reported mudslides along Route 5 and Route 9. Back roads had washouts.

Parts of Rutland City also flooded amid the heavy rains.

Today, only scattered showers and thunderstorms are likely across the Northeast, including Vermont.

No more flooding is expected, except in northern Maine, where the storms might be heavy enough to cause further flash flooding

Here's a video of some flooding along Route 9 west of Brattleboro, Vermont:

Scaling Back The Storm Totals In Vermont, Still Tons Of Snow East

Latest snowfall map from the National Weather
Service in South Burlington, Vermont. Latest
trends put the heaviest snow a little
more to the east than previous forecasts. 

As of late afternoon, the heaviest of the snow was moving into and through Vermont, but the show was just beginning in New Hampshire and Maine, and along the New England coast.  

I maybe was too quick to cheer the American computer model this morning, as it looks as if the storm will track a wee bit further to the east tonight.

The European model was closer to reality after all, it looks like.

That means the snow will taper off sooner in western Vermont than earlier thought, with the bulk of it over before midnight.  Still, the winter storm warnings for most of Vermont and the winter weather advisory in the Champlain Valley remain in effect.

It'll continue on through most of the night in eastern Vermont as they'll be close enough to the compact, intense storm to get a good deal of snow out of it.

This evening's commute across all of Vermont is shaping up as the worst of the storm's existence. The snow is widespread across Vermont, roads are slickening up and the snow will continue to come down moderately to heavy at times.  Locally gusty winds will cause blowing and drifting.

You'll need to take care and go slow on the way home this evening. There were already numerous reports of slide offs and (mostly) minor crashes as of 4 p.m. Thursday.

The National Weather Service office in South Burlington has scaled back the amount of snow Vermont will get, but don't worry. The ski areas will get less than anticipated, but still a pretty good dump.

I'll let the NWS Burlington forecast discussion from this afternoon outline it for you:

"Expecting storm totals of 6 to 12 inches central/eastern VT, including Northeast Kingdom and Northern Green Mountains....with 6 to 8 inches western slopes and 2 to 6 inches Champlain Valely and northern Adirondacks. 

Snow tapers off across the St. Lawrence Valely and parts of the (Adirondacks) by evening commute and Champlain Valley by 9 or 10 p.m., but continues into early Friday for eastern Vermont/NEK (Northeast Kingdom) with redevelopment along the western slopes and dacks expected o Friday."

The reason for all this is the storm center now looks like it will pass over Cape Cod, not Boston as the American computer models hinted earlier. This eastward shift takes most of Vermont out of the running for the heaviest snow.

New Hampshire and western Maine are still in the sweet spot for very heavy snow overnight so careful if you're heading east toward that region. Or just don't bother.

We're still expecting a wet northwest air flow in back of the storm Friday, which is why snow will redevelop in the western slopes of the Green Mountains and the Adirondacks. The wet air will be forced to rise up the slopes, and that will cause the moisture in the air to condense into snowflakes.

That could be good for an additional three to six inches for some of the ski areas on Friday. Just flurries are likely in the Champlain Valley Friday.

Trouble With Unwarned Storm In Alabama, And Ignoring A Warned Storm In New Hampshire

Inside a Troy, Alabama Walmart after a suspected
tornado heavily damaged the store.  

UPDATE: The National Weather Service in Birmingham confirms that it WAS a tornado that trashed that Walmart.

In their defense, as noted in an update in Dennis Mersereau's Vane blog, the rotation in this storm as depicted by radar last night appeared to be fairly weak.

These weakly rotating storms rarely end up producing a tornado, so the National Weather Service usually doesn't issue tornado warnings for such storms.

Weakly rotating storms often pass over Alabama, and the National Weather Service is reluctant to issue tornado warnings for storms that are highly unlikely to actually produce a twister.

If you issue too many warnings with nothing materializing, you get accused of crying "Wolf!" too many times, which would lead people to ignore warnings for more dangerous storms in the future.

In rare cases, and this looks like it might be one of those weird cases, the rotation appeared weak, but the tornado was there, and fairly strong.

To my relatively untrained eye, the rotation signals looked pretty obvious. But obvious does not mean strong, and obviously doesn't always mean a tornado is there, especially if the rotation isn't violently strong.

It all goes to prove that we still have quite a bit more to learn about tornadoes and other severe weather hazards.

I'd bet my next paycheck that a lot of meteorologists will be studying this event in detail to see what could be learned from this situation. It'll also be a topic of seminars and conversations at future meteorological conferences.

PREVIOUS DISCUSSION

Despite a National Weather Service apparatus that can usually detect potential tornadoes, one apparently hit without warning last night in Troy, Alabama.

The storms hit a Walmart and a sports equipment store while people were inside, caving in roofs. Miraculously, nobody died, but at least five people were hurt.

Dennis Mersereau, who writes Gawker's The Vane weather blog, broke some disturbing news about the lack of warnings for this tornado.

Sometimes, tornadoes aren't easily visible in radar and wind velocity detecting equipment, and so warnings don't get issued.

In this case, Mersereau shows radar images that had can't miss signs of a tornado associated with its parent thunderstorm  at least as early as 10:24 p.m. last night. A tornado warning was not issued until 10:39 p.m., after the stores had been hit.

Forecasters sometimes miss tornadoes because there's no clear sign of them on radar. But this one had a pronounced hook echo, and other images on radar called base velocity showed a very tight rotation, indicating a tornado.
.
Overall, the area where the tornado hit in Alabama was not considered at high risk of a tornado on Thursday, but obviously, one likely did hit. Goes to show these things can happen even when conditions are only marginally ripe for severe weather.

Mersereau said he has reached out to the National Weather Service office in Birmingham, Alabama, which is responsible for weather warnings in that area, to get an explanation.

Sporting goods store heavily damaged by
 a likely tornado in Troy, Alabama last night. 

As Mersereau notes, the Birmingham NWS office is in tornado country and usually does an excellent job with tornado warnings.

I don't know if there really was a slip up last night with the Troy, Alabama tornado warning. It'll be interesting to see what Mersereau finds out from the National Weather Service.

However, nobody's perfect. There could have been a mistake, or somebody might have been asleep at the switch. We'll find out.

If Mersereau is right with the timing of the events, the National Weather Service in Birmingham has some explaining to do. Not because heads should roll, but because this could be a learning opportunity for monitoring, forecasting and warning people during future storms.

Meanwhile, we have news of the risk of NOT responding to weather warnings. The National Weather Service in Gray, Maine on Monday issued a severe thunderstorm warning for the Lancaster, New Hampshire area, where a local fair was going on alerting people to oncoming wind gusts of at least 60 mph.

That's enough to rip a circus tent up.

The warning was issued about 20 minutes before a circus tent collapsed, killing a father and young daughter and injuring several others.

The warning was issued just before the start of the evening's show. Also, forecasters had been saying since at least the day before the storm that there was the possibility of severe weather. 

Plus, severe weather had been reported in neighboring Vermont and further south in New Hampshire earlier that afternoon. That activity was heading north, so it would have been worth it to watch things, with or without official warnings from the National Weather Service.

It's the responsibility of an outdoor venue operator to monitor weather and evacuate people to sturdier shelters when storm warnings are issued. It's still unclear why this circus did not postpone the show and move people to stronger buildings when the warning was issued.

I don't even know yet if somebody was monitoring the National Weather Service for warnings and updates.

It is a bummer when an outdoor event is canceled due to the threat of severe weather, but that disappointment pales in comparison to lives lost.

I've seen how this type of thing is done right. On a sunny Saturday in early June, I was at the annual Rockin' Rib Fest outdoor festival in Yankton, South Dakota.

While I was there, a tornado watch was issued for the area. A watch is a step down from a warning. A watch means a tornado is possible, a warning means a tornado is imminent or at least very likely.

The Rib Fest organizers announced the tornado watch to the crowd less than 10 minutes after it had been issued.   The announcer just told people to keep an eye to the sky and listen for later updates, but the festival continued, which was proper, since there was no severe weather nearby at the time.

Ultimately, there was no tornado that day in or near Yankton, but a lot of lightning developed later that evening. The lightning prompted organizers to shut the whole event down and everyone was urged to leave and get out of harms way as thunderstorms rattled over Yankton for hours that Saturday night. 

Organizers surely lost a lot of money in cancelling the annual event. But imagine how horrible it would have been if lightning or strong winds hit the event with hundreds or thousands of people there.

To me, better safe than sorry. 

Severe Weather Continues: New England Slammed

Impressive storm approaches town of Glen Lake, MI
Sunday in a severe weather outbreak that
 moved east into New England Monday and Tuesday.  

The severe weather that blasted the Great Lakes region Sunday moved east and hammered New England Monday.

The bad thunderstorms appeared to lose none of their ferocity as they reached the Northeast.

Even worse, the severe weather is continuing in New England today, and possibly tomorrow as well.

The biggest and by far the most tragic headline from the New England storms is the severe winds that hit a local fair in Lancaster, New Hampshire, in the far northern part of that state near the Vermont border.

Two people - a father and daughter - and at least 15 were injured when the severe storm collapsed and blew away a big circus tent. About 100 people were taking shelter from the downpour in the tent when the wind gusts hit.

The severe thunderstorms, one of which was the one that hit Lancaster, were fascinating in a scary way. They developed explosively along or just west of the spine of Vermont's Green Mountains, that south-to north running mountain chain running up the entire middle of the state.

The storms seemed to come out of nowhere. One minute, they're just some small clouds producing a few local shower, and seemingly minutes later, they were severe.

One storm developed near Monkton, Vermont in the early afternoon, and within a half hour moved northeastward to the town of Richmond, where it deposited hail almost the size of golf balls

Police cruiser smushed by fallen tree in
a severe thunderstorm in Barrington,
Rhode Island Tuesday morning.  

Once the storms developed they raced northeastward into eastern Vermont, and then they pummeled much of New Hampshire and Maine.

There were many, many reports of trees downed and power out in the eastern half of Vermont, much of New Hampshire and the northwestern half of Maine on Monday.

Other destructive thunderstorms were reported in Ohio and Pennsylvania on Monday.

The severe weather roared on this Tuesday morning.

Before 7 a.m., the National Weather Service in Taunton, Mass. warned of a "particularly dangerous situation" as a severe thunderstorm possibly packing winds of 80 mph ripped across Rhode Island and into southeastern Massachusetts.

This morning's pack of storms lit up the sky over New York City with lightning early this morning, tossed down numerous trees in Connecticut before trashing Rhode Island. Warwick reported a gust of 68 mph, and winds reached 67 mph in Providence with these storms.

An enteire lawn was upended when a very severe thunderstorm
uprooted a large tree in Cranston, Rhode Island Tuesday
morning. Photo from @Hayleigh_Meeker via Twitter.  n

As I write this, there are reports of multiple injuries from the storms at a Charlestown, Rhode Island campground, and police cars at the public safety building at Barrington, Rhode Island were smushed by a large falling tree.

Today, more severe thunderstorms will likely develop in New England, especially in the eastern half of the region. Strong winds and big hail are the biggest threats.

Yet more damage is possible on Wednesday, especially in the northern half of New England. A pool of very cold air for this time of year will pass overhead. The strong August sun will heat the ground.

When that happens, you get rapid updrafts and lots of showers and thunderstorms, some with gusty winds. Worse, with the cold pool overhead, you don't have to go up all that high to get below freezing.

That means lots of hail could form in the thunderstorms, and since the atmosphere will be relatively cool, the hailstones won't melt that fast on the way down. So damaging hail is possible in spots Wednesday, especially in parts of far northeastern New York, and much of Vermont, New Hampshire and Maine.

Things should settle down nicely toward the end of the week, with somewhat cooler than normal conditions for August in the Northeast.




Here's something that I've never understood on YouTube:

I look up "severe thunderstorm" and 99 percent of the results are a boring still shot of a weather radio squawking out a severe thunderstorm warning.

Is there some weird club that does this?


Here's a time lapse of a beach being hastily evacuated as Sunday's supercell thunderstorm approached:


Here's a neighborhood in Chicago being trashed by huge winds and hail:

The Best Weather Forecaster In Any Media Is The Hillbillly

The Hillbilly Weatherman in New Hampshire
forecasting more snow as only he can. 

Hat tip to my fellow weather geek Ellen Cronin for finding this one:

We've discovered, by far, the best weather forecaster that I've ever seen.

I can't vouch for his accuracy, but the Hillbilly Weatherman out of New Hampshire is the ultimate in meteorological awesomeness.

His schtick in a thick New Hampshah accent is definitely NSFW. A few people might find his way with words rather sexist.

But I so wish some of the cookie-cutter smiling TV meteorologists out there would take a page from this guy's playbook and tell like it really is.

As everybody at this point well knows, New England has been pretty battered by winter this year. Hillbilly Weatherman is the perfect way to get your frustrations out on this;

Here's one video he put out earlier this month. I love the reference to snow "asshole deep to a ten-foot Indian:

Like I said, the video is definitely NSFW but do find a chance to watch. There's a million F-bombs, but it's worth it in this forecast from last Friday. You can tell he's getting sick of winter. As Hillbilly Weatherman notes, it's so cold "Fuckin' penguins are getting blue balls."

Here it is:




Then we have this one:

Big New Hampshire Snow Squall Crash Another Case of Reckless Driving

The pileup on Interstate 93 near Ashland, N.H. today.  

A sudden snow squall rolled through parts of New Hampshire today, contributing to a big highway pileup on Interstate 93 near Ashland, north of Concord.  

Up to 100 cars were involved in the crash, one truck burst into flames when a car crunched beneath it, and a few people got hurt.

What a mess!

I don't have empirical proof, but it seems to me that most of these gigantic highway crashes on snowy, icy roads happen during brief or unexpected snow squalls, or near the start of a snowstorm.

Here's what I think is going on: People are blasting their way down the highway on dry pavement when it starts to snow.

In the case of a snow squall, the pavement very quickly goes from dry and fine to slippery and dangerous. Most people respond by slowing down so they can brake more easily if they have to, and because visiblilty is low and it's better to go take your time in those situations.

That's most people.

But there's always a few oblivious idiots in the mix that keep zooming along at 75 mph or more. Then out of the murk of the snow squall, they see all those slow moving people up ahead.

The Oblivious Idiots then slam on the brakes, but can't stop, so they slam into the clot of slow moving cars and trucks.

Then, another clot of slow moving cars encounters the crash, and stops so they don't get involved. But, inevitably, more Oblivious Idiots are racing toward the stopped traffic, and they crash into the mess as well.

Every time I hear about these crashes, like the one in New Hampshire, the police say some people were driving too fast for the conditions.

But all the Oblivious Idiots get is a traffic ticket and a wrecked car.

I've said this before and I'll say it again. Why not really punish the Oblivious Idiots?  I'm sure a traffic investigation and eyewitness interviews can often determine which cars were being driven responsibly, and which had Oblivious Idiots behind the wheel.

Put it this way:  If I went through a parking lot and smashed the hell out of 35 or so cars with a sledgehammer, and injure a few people in the process, I'd face multiple criminal charges and probably spend months or years behind bars.

The Oblivious Idiots are essentially rampaging through a parking lot with a sledgehammer when they cause these huge crashes, so why don't they spend months or years in jail?

Set an example and maybe other Oblivious Idiots would get the message and slow down.

Flooding Starting To Recede, But Still A Mess This Morning

Except in the lower reaches of the rivers and in Lake Champlain, water is beginning to recede this morning following a pretty nasty spring flood, but a lot of roads remain closed in New York, New Hampshire and especially Vermont this morning.

This motorist steered around a
"road closed" sign in Enosburg,
Vermont Tuesday and started
to drive across flooded Boston Post
Road, then thought the better of it
and backed out. Good thing.  

The level of flooding, which closed dozens of roads, had been expected for days, enabling people to prepare for it, but there's only so much you can do.

Worse, the abrupt turn to winter has turned the roads not affected by flooding into a slow mess for this morning's commute. Between the detours around high water and the ice, expect it to take awhile to get to work.

The flooding reached beyond the minor catagory into the level of moderate and even major, according to the National Weather Service in South Burlington. Water crept into towns like Jeffersonville and Cambridge along the Lamoille River, for instance.

There were warnings in Montpelier, Vermont yesterday for businesses to remove items from basements, and the city closed some parking lots that were endangered by flooding. However, Winooski River water didn't get as high in Montpelier as first feared.

I'm sure there have been some houses and businesses damaged by at least basement flooding elsewhere in Vermont, New York and New Hampshire

Most of the roads that are closed by high water this morning are in the Champlain Valley, in the lower reaches of the rivers where the crest is heading to Lake Champlain.

And now there's a flood warning for Lake Champlain, as all that water flows into the lake. Early Wednesday morning, the lake water level was 99.6 feet above sea level and rising fast. It should go above the flood stage of 100 feet later today.  

Lake Champlain flooding lasts a long time, and the lake water will continue rising for the rest of the week.  Forecasts indicate the lake could reach 100.7 feet by Friday. If it gets windy, battering waves could start to cause damage to roads, camps and houses when the lake gets that high.

Water from the flooding Lamoille River surrounds
 a house in Cambridge, Vermont on Tuesday.  

The lake level should start falling again next week unless we get a pretty decent amount of rain.

Speaking of a decent amount of rain, that was true yesterday. Most of northern New York, Vermont and a good chunk of New Hampshire and Maine got between one and two inches of rain.

Burlington, Vermont got 1.67 inches of rain, breaking the record rainfall for the date of 1.41 set in 1942.

St. Johnsbury, Vermont also had a record rainfall for the date of 1.63 inches.

The snow is yet another issue. Burlington, Vermont got 2.6 inches of snow later yesterday, and there's 3.5 inches of new snow outside my door in St. Albans, Vermont. Such mid-April snowstorms are somewhat rare in the North Country but certainly not unheard of.

The amount of snow that fell in Burlington was not even a record for the date. And on April 17, 1983, Burlington got 11.3 inches of snow. So the white landscape this morning is disheartening for fans of spring, but not that out of the ordinary.

Temperatures early today are in the teens and low 20s, so yes, the roads are icy.

Water from the flooding Lamoille River surges
across Route 15 in Cambridge, Vermont on Tuesday.  

The good news in all this is, aside from Lake Champlain, the flooding will gradually end today. And this winter like cold wave will last only 24 hours or so before spring returns.

True, it will only get into the mid 30s today and temperatures will fall to near record teens tonight.

However, starting Thursday afternoon and continuing through the weekend and on into early next week, normal spring temperatures in the 50s and low 60s.

And although more rain is in the forecast over the weekend it looks like it will come in the form of scattered, rather light showers, and not be enough to set off more flooding.

You can start enjoying spring again soon. Bring it on!

Floods, Wild Weather Changes For Vermont, Rest of Northeast Today

As you drive to work this morning, you'll notice that you pretty much didn't need your jacket, that it was almost a summer-like start to this Tuesday.

As I've been writing about this week's flood potential over
the past few days, I've been running photos of the last
big spring flood in 2011, like this wash load ruined by the
Missisquoi River near Berkshire, Vemont. .After today and
tomorrow, I'll probably have fresh flood photos from April, 2014.  

I really, really hope you brought your jacket with you, though. You'll need it for your return trip home. It will get cold.

Plus, you might have already had to go around a detour or to due to flooded roads this morning.

That kind of flood avoidance is even more likely this afternoon as already high water gets even higher.

It's going to be a wild weather day.  Expect flooding rains, strong winds, temperatures that will fall unbelievably fast, and an accumulation of snow later on.

Flood watches continue for much of the interior northeast, including New York, Vermont and New Hampshire. In many spots, those flood watches have already turn to warnings, which means some flooding has already started. Rivers across New York and Vermont are already climbing over their banks due to yesterday's near record, summer like warmth and last night's showers.

It's windy out there, too. Especially in the Champlain Valley. A wind advisory is up because gusts will probably reach 50 mph later this morning and early this afternoon. A few branches and power lines could come down.

With warmth and more scattered showers this morning, then a burst of drenching rains on its way for a rendezvous with New York and western New England later this morning and afternoon, things will definitely get worse out there.

The one to two inches of rain we'll get from this strong, strong cold front coming in wouldn't normally be that big a deal, but with rivers already flooding, the flooding will get intensify, in some spots beyond the usual "Farmer John's hayfield next to the creek is under water again."

A lot of roads in New York, Vermont and New Hampshire will be blocked by flood waters by this afternoon and tonight, and the water might get high enough in some areas of the region to damage houses and businesses. At least some basements will turn into swimming pools.

So be careful out there. Especially tonight, on the roads, when it's dark and snowing and and icy and you can't see flood waters almost until you drive into them.

Yes, I said that dirty four letter word.  Snow. When the cold front comes through at midday, or this afternoon if you're more toward the east in New Hampshire, temperatures will fall as much as 20 degrees in less than an hour. Then they'll keep falling and the rain will turn to snow.

Expect a dusting to an inch tonight in the Champlain Valley, and 1 to 4 inches across much of the rest of northern New York, Vermont and parts of New Hampshire.

Leave some extra time to get to work Wednesday morning. With the snow and temperatures around 20 degrees, the roads will probably be icy. Yes, I KNOW it's mid-April and that shouldn't be happening, but this is the North Country.

Deal with it.

We're not the only ones feeling the chill. A vast section of the nation from Texas through the South and the Mid Atlantic Coast, and Ohio Valley, are under a freeze warning tonight. Gardens and crops are in over there and it's going to get below freezing tonight in that huge section of the country.

So, expect some crop losses because of that.  (Here in the North Country, plants have not budded enough to suffer any real damage from the teens and 20s expected tonight and Wednesday night_

Parts of Minnesota and Wisconsin are under a winter storm watch as that region could get up to a foot of snow tomorrow.  In International Falls, Minnesota this morning, it was 6 degrees above zero. Not the kind of April I want.

On the bright side, the Return of Winter, 2014 won't last very long.  The South will turn balmy over the next few days, and the Midwest snow will melt over the weekend.

Here in Vermont, It'll be a blustery, cold Wednesday with temperatures in many spots not rising out of the 30s with a gusty northwest wind. But at least the sun will come out in the afternoon.

After a bitingly cold Wednesday night, Thursday won't be bad with readings popping back up to near 50. And the weekend up in this neck of the woods looks seasonably mild, with temperatures in the 50s, and scattered showers. But no flooding rains.

After the extreme weather of today and Wednesday, the boring weather we're expecting this weekend is going to be a real treat.