Huge, Wet Vermont Snowstorm To Bring Arduous Cleanup, Increases Flood Threat

Here we go again. Digging out from another foot of wet, heavy snow
in St. Albans, Vermont. Seems that's all I ever do with my life in
the past couple years - just constantly dig out from giant,
 wet cemet snowstorms 

UPDATE 9 a.m. SATURDAY:

Some really spectacular snow totals have come in to the National Weather Service in Burlington as of 9 a.m.:

26 inches new was reported in Morgan, 25 inches in Lyndonville, 24 inches Danville and Walden.

There's lots of reports of 12-20 inches of new snow.

The high water content of this snow really makes this in many parts of Vermont one of the most significant late season snows on record.

PREVIOUS DISCUSSION:

The big snowstorm in Vermont will mercifully end today, but the heavy, wet snow will be backbreaking to clean up especially areas away from the deepest valleys.

Many of us, including me here in St. Albans, Vermont, got at least a foot of snow.

As of 5:30 a.m. it was an even foot deep at my house, on a hill away from Lake Champlain in St. Albans. And it was still snowing.

Which means the never-ending winter, when a snow cover was established in early to mid November, will go on for weeks more, as it will take a long time for this to melt.

As of early morning, no new summaries had come out yet of storm totals in Vermont since last evening. I'm sure there will be some pretty amazing numbers in the mountains. As of last evening, there had already been 18 inches of new snow in East Kirby, Cabot and Walden, Vermont.

More than a foot had fallen by 7 p.m. last evening in many towns at elevations of above 1,000 feet in northern Vermont. In many of those towns, it kept snowing all night. More than 2,000 people remained without power early this morning, mostly in northwestern Vermont where the snow really hit overnight.

Roadways, needless to say, are very bad in areas where it's still snowing. The western slopes of the Green Mountains and eastern parts of Franklin, Chittenden and Addison counties are particularly bad.

Very little of the snow will melt this afternoon, as it will stay cold even as the sun comes out. A brief thaw tomorrow won't get rid of much, and then it will be wintry cold again Monday, Tuesday and into Wednesday before it finally warms up.

Which brings us to something I alluded to as the storm began.  A flood threat. Warmer air will finally, at least temporarily reach us late in the week.  If the warmth lasts and increases, and then it rains, it will be real trouble.

This storm had a LOT of what would have been rain with it. Most places in Vermont got more than the equivalent of an inch of rain. Some places got the equivalent of two inches. As I mentioned on Thursday, there was already four to eight inches of rain locked in the snow pack at mid and higher elevations in and around Vermont, and up to ten inches of "rain" on the peaks.

This storm added one to as much as three inches of "rain" to the snow pack that will eventually have to melt. In the warmer valleys where rain fell during the first half of the storm, the downpours soaked the ground even more and created some runoff.

The bright side is after today there will be very little precipitation in Vermont through this coming Friday, but then, not much of the snow will have melted by then, especially in mid and high elevations.

If April turns out to be warm, stormy and wet, there is definitely the risk of at least some flooding. A worst case scenario is a storm in early to mid April that brings a surge of very warm, moist air and one to three inches of rain would cause serious flooding.

I don't see anything like that in the cards now, which is good. And, if we get an orderly melt, with lots of dry days, warm afternoons and chilly nights - perfect for surgaring - things won't be that bad at all.

Lake Champlain's level is already a little above normal - right around 97 feet above sea level as of yesterday.  Minor flood stage is 100 feet.

I'm almost sure the lake will reach minor flood stage. Just over 100 feet will cause minor beach erosion and flood the lowest lying shoreline places, like Perkins Pier in Burlington. However, a minor spring flood on Lake Champlain is actually a good thing. It's a natural cycle that keeps the ecosystem healthy.

If Lake Champlain flooding reaches 101 feet you start to get some real shoreline damage. I see that as possible this year but at this point rather unlikely.

We are also NOT in the same situation as 2011, when Lake Champlain eventually rose to a record crest of around 103 feet above sea level, causing millions of dollars in flood damage. Unless there is incredible, record rainfall between now and mid-May, we won't get close to that level of disaster.

I just don't see that happening.

In the meantime, for those of us who got clobbered by this storm, happy digging!

Time For A Deeper Dive Into Two Tropical Storm Threats

This map from the Weather Channel depicts insane amunts of rain
from Cyclone Mekunu in Oman and Yemen. In an area that gets
normally gets roughly five inches of year, up to a foot and a half
could come down in just a couple days. 

There are two odd threats looming in the tropical storm department:

A powerful storm is threatening to bring disaster upon Oman and Yemen this week, and a messy tropical system threatens flooding in the southeastern United States early next week.

Let's go overseas first, where the bigger of the two problems is looming.

CYCLONE MEKUNU

As of last night, Cyclone Mekunu was a borderline Category 1/Category 2 hurricane. (They're called cyclones where this one is, but a hurricane and a cyclone are the same thing.) Sustained winds are in the dangerous 90 to 95 mph range.

Mekong could easily end up becoming the strongest tropical cyclone on record to hit the Arabian Peninsula when it makes landfall near the Yemen-Oman border, says the India Meteorological Department.

According to Bob Henson in the Category 6 weather blog, Mekunu is worrying for two principal reasons: It's going to hit land at a nearly perpendicular angle, which would increase the winds, waves and storm surge in Oman.

It's also likely hitting near a populated area: The city of Salalah, Oman, population about 340,000, can expect a nasty storm surge and major flood.

The normally arid area where Mekunu is expected to hit will probably get eight to 16 inches of rain, with more in the nearby mountains. This in an area that normally gets just roughly five inches of rain per year. You can imagine, then, how destructive the floods will be with a storm that brings two year's worth of rain in a day or two.

This will be a major, deadly disaster, folks.

WANNABE TROPICAL STORM ALBERTO

A big area of the Southeast can expect flooding rains from a
tropical system to form in the Gulf of Mexico in the coming days
Areas in red and oranage at this point look to be at most risk.

It looks almost certain now that some sort of tropical system will affect the eastern or central Gulf Coast of the United States in the coming days.

What exactly that will be is still open to question, but dangerous flooding is becoming an increasing risk.

That weather disturbance that was near Belize the other day has moved north to near the Yucatan Peninsula in Mexico and will emerge into the Gulf of Mexico in the next day or two.

Normally, this time of year, upper level winds are too strong in the Gulf of Mexico to support a tropical system.

These upper level winds rip apart thunderstorms that would form into a tropical storm, so they don't happen. Over the next few days, those upper level winds over the Gulf aren't all that strong, so this thing has the potential to develop.

It'll probably form into a tropical or subtropical depression in the coming days. (A subtropical system has characteristics of both a tropical storm and a regular old storm system.) There's a chance this storm could become strong enough to be declared a tropical storm, with sustained winds of 39 mph.

If it achieves tropical storm status, it will be named Alberto.

Whether or not this thing becomes a tropical storm, it will bring boatloads of moisture into the southeastern United States, so flooding is a real concern in that part of the country. It doesn't help that parts of the area that are in for a soaking from Wannabe Alberto are already quite wet from previous rains, so this could be a real troublemaker.

Wannabe Alberto will never become one of those nice pinwheel shaped tropical systems or hurricanes that you often see in satellite photos. It'll be a messy mass of clouds and downpours that will slowly invade the Southeast.

The Atlantic tropical storm season officially begins on June 1, so this might form before then. But tropical systems sometimes form before the "official" start of the hurricane season. Just because this is early doesn't necessarily mean the overall hurricane season will be especially nasty, like last year.

It's too soon to tell how bad the upcoming hurricane season will be, but here's one hopeful sign: Water temperatures in the area of the Atlantic where the most powerful hurricanes tend to form in August and September are cooler than average. If this state of affairs continues, that could cut down on hurricanes since these things need warm water to thrive. And the warmer the better, as far as hurricanes are concerned.

Then again, the National Hurricane Center today issued a forecast calling for a near normal to busier than normal hurricane season. We shall see!

California Ski Resort Has Had About 65 FEET Of Snow This Season

Uncovering a ski resort shack recently at Squaw Alpine
near Lake Tahoe, California. 

Here in Vermont, ski season is winding down, after a weird winter, that ultimately ended up OK with a fair amount of snow for winter sports enthusiasts.

A few die-hard resorts are open in the North Country, but as things green up and warm up, that will end soon, too.

Out in California, maybe not as soon as here. Several ski resorts have had 700 inches or more of snow this stormy snow season, and one resort is flirting with 800 inches.

According to the Weather Channel, the Sugar Bowl Resort in the northern Sierra Nevada mountains has had 777 inches of snow so far, and more might be on the way. That's nearly 65 FEET of snow.

Imagine shoveling that out of your driveway.  Then again, you wouldn't even be able to find your house, so there's that.

Of course, there was never 65 feet of snow on the ground at Sugar Bowl Resort because some snow compacted and melted over the course of the season. But still, there's a LOT of snow out ther.e

Believe it or not, the deep snow at Sugar Bowl isn't even close to the record for the most snow in one season at a place in the United States.

That honor goes to Mount Baker Ski Area in Washington State, which had 1,140 inches of snow during the winter of 1998-99. That would be 95 feet of snow.

This year, all that snow stored up in the Sierra Nevada mountains is a good thing, since it will melt over the course of spring and summer and feed reservoirs needed for drinking water and agriculture.

Melting snow from the Sierra Nevada normally supplies about one third of California's drinking and irrigation water supplies.

The melt from the Sierra Nevada hasn't started in earnest yet. In fact, they might get a little more snow in the next couple of days.

The one drawback to all this reservoir-replenishing snow in the California mountains is what happens if it melts too fast?

Snowpack in the Sierra was 164 percent of average as of April 1, which is normally near the peak of the snow depth in those mountains. That's the most since 2011 and the seventh most since 1950, says the Los Angeles Times.

If any strong heat waves develop over California, the rapid snow melt could overrun rivers, especially in the San Joaquin Valley, which already had its share of flooding during the winter storms earlier this year.

The bottom line: California is loving all this water coming off the mountains, but they don't want it all at once. A little at a time, please.

Northern New England Flood Threat Continues For The Next Few Weeks

The deep, late winter snow on the ground is finally starting to melt across northern New York, and in Vermont, New Hampshire and Maine, which means now we have to start watching out for flooding.

Spring flooding near Enosburg, Vermont in
April, 2011. Similar scenes are possible
in northern New England over the next
few weeks.  

The National Weather Service in South Burlington, Vermont did its biweekly flood potential update last evening, and meteorologists there continue to say there's an above normal risk of spring flooding in the region.

And if flooding happens, it could easily occur starting now and the risk would continue for  at least the rest of the month.

At first, the biggest threat is ice jams, as some rivers, particularly more to the north, have thick ice on them. It's going to rain tonight, and again early next week, and that might be enough to start moving the ice and forming ice jams.

(And yes, there is a winter weather advisory up for tonight for most of central and eastern Vermont because of the risk of freezing rain and sleet, but it's still going to rain, too)

Ice jams can form quickly, and flooding behind those jams can form quickly, so be on the alert, starting tomorrow for this risk.

Another rain storm is due early next week, which could also set off the ice jams and low land flooding.

If we get a big period of very warm weather and heavy rain, it would combine with snow melt from the hills and mountains to contribute to some potentially nasty river flooding.

Don't let the bare spots in the snow on valley floors fool you. There's plenty of water locked up in the snow in the woods, and if you go up in elevation only a tiny bit, you get even more water locked up in deep snow.

In the Champlain Valley, there's up to four inches of rain within the remaining snow, says the National Weather Service. At elevations of between 1,000 and 2,500 feet, theres four to eight inches of rain locked up in the snow pack.

If flooding happens in Lake Champlain, and minor flooding is a good bet, it won't happen for awhile yet. In the past week, the lake level has risen from 94.9 feet above sea level to 95.66 feet. So the rise has started, but we've got a long way to go before the lake reaches minor flood stage, which is 100 feet.

It's still, of course impossible to say whether we will get much flooding. The weather pattern for most of the rest of April looks cool, which would be good because we'd get a gradual snow melt to minimize the flood risk.

On the other hand, the weather pattern looks like it will be active, with a parade of mid-sized rain storms, which might raise the flood risk.  Long range forecasts indicate the region will get one to two inches of rain, total, over the next week or so, which would be somewhat wetter than normal.

And there's no telling if one of these storms in the parade of systems might drop an unusually heavy amount of rain, or squirt a shot of very warm air into Vermont. That would be the worst case scenario for flooding.

So, if you live in a flood prone spot, there's no guarantee you'll get high water, but I'd prepare for it, just to be on the safe side.