Flooding, Ice, Blizzard-Like Conditions In Vermont This Saturday Morning

Amy Kolb Noyes posted what appears to be significant
and damaging ice jam flooding in Johnson, Vermont amid
Saturday morning's snowstorm. 

UPDATE: 11 a.m.:

Extensive flooding is reported around Johnson, Vermont due to ice jam flooding.

Route 15 in the area is closed, and photos on social media show flooded buildings amid swirling snow in the Johnson area. An emergency shelter has been opened by the
Johnson, Vermont fire department.

Evacuations are also reported due to ice jam flooding around Swanton, Vermont.

Rainfall Friday was particularly heavy in the Lamoille River basin, which includes the Johnson areas. Nearby Eden received 2.82 inches of rain - an incredible amount for January.

Many other weather stations in and near the northern and central Green Mountains had two inches of rain or more. Between that, and the record warm temperatures Friday and the snowmelt, it's understandable now why the flooding turned out to be worse than expected.

Stay tuned for more details.

PREVIOUS DISCUSSION

It's not every day in Vermont in which there are flood warnings on many of the state's major rivers, while blizzard-iike conditions are hitting parts of the state, and ice is weighing down trees in other parts of Vermont.

Yep, in case you haven't noticed, it's wicked bad out there this morning, as expected.  There are floods, there is zero visibility in snow, the roads are horrendous, and you should just stay home until it gets better later today.

Heavy snow falling on St. Albans, Vermont Saturday
morning, one day after it was 60 degrees.

As of 8:30 a.m. Saturday, it was snowing hard at my house in St. Albans, in northwestern Vermont. Conditions are easily the most challenging they've been since the epic Pi Day blizzard last March 14.

Yes, there's much less snow than that March three-foot epic, but visibility is down to near zero in heavy snow and blowing snow. Snowfall rates now in the Champlain Valley are going at one to two inches per hour, which is a lot.

Roads are practically impassable. Nobody is even trying to make it up the steep hill in front of my house. The wind is gusting to about 35 mph and the temperature is down to 12 degrees. It was 60 degrees just yesterday afternoon. Now, it's absolutely brutal.

The heavy rains and record warm temperatures have led to ice jams on many area rivers, including the Winooski, Lamoille, Mississquoi, Otter Creek and others. Amid all this snow and ice, some Vermont roads are close by the ice jams and flooding, including Route 2 near Montpelier and Route 78 near West Swanton.

There are reports of an emergency shelter opening up in Swanton today, in case some homes are surrounded by ice jams, so it is pretty serious out there.

Hard to see (click on picture to make it bigger, but this
web cam grab from 9:25 a.m. Saturday morning shows
near zero visibility on Interstate 89 in Georgia, Vermont,
with a police vehicle helping a motorist that had
slid off the road. 

The intense snowfall rates in western and northern Vermont this morning will taper off later this morning and this afternoon, so just hang tight until then. It's worth it just to hunker down and wait it out.

Amid the chaos outside, thank goodness the power outages aren't too, too bad. As of 9:15 a.m., about 1,300 homes and businesses were without power, mostly in central and southern Vermont.

The overall forecast remains the same. The snow will taper off and end tonight, save for a few mostly mountain snow showers. We are definitely back to the Arctic deep freeze, with subzero lows tonight and highs only in the single numbers Sunday.

But hey, at least the skiers and winter sports fans got some of their snow back.

Speaking of which, it's still looking questionable during the upcoming Tuesday to Thursday time frame. It definitely looks like it's going to snow, but the computer models, as they were yesterday, are still arguing over whether it will be a lot of snow, or just a little.

Another Day Of Weather Extremes Across Vermont, Northeast And It Ain't Over Yet

Boston Post Road near Enosburg, Vermot covered
with ice chunks and water as the Missisquoi River rises
amid rain and record high January temperatures Friday.

As of late afternoon Friday, we're still experiencing quite an extreme weather day here in Vermont and in the rest of the Northeast.

Flood watches and warnings, and a variety of winter weather alerts remain in play overnight and into Saturday as some truly bizarre weather moves through.

Record highs were abundant today across the region, just five days after record cold. As of last report, it got up to 61 degrees in Burlington, Vermont, breaking the old record of 55 degrees set back in 1980.

That's a full 81 degrees warmer than the record low of 20 below set just this past Sunday. Elsewhere in Vermont and eastern New York, there were a few reports of temperatures as high as 64 degrees.

Two more kind of weather geeky observations from today: Dewpoints got into the mid 50s. (The dewpoint is the level the temperature has to fall to fully saturate the air. It's a decent measure of how humid it feels out there.)

A dewpoint of 60 degrees in the summer makes us feel a little sweaty. Dewpoints in the mid-50s, like today, are actually quite common in July here in Vermont. Remember, if you can, one of hose pleasantly warm summer days when you're at the beach and it's sunny and 80 and the sky is blue and the humidity isn't so bad and it's a perfect out for swimming and picnicking and anything else. The dewpoint was probably in the mid-50s on that day you are remembering.

Another indication is something called precipitable water. It's kind of technical, but it's a measure of how much water is in the air that's available to come down as rain or some other form of precipitation.

Precipitable water is usually much higher in the summer than in the winter, since warm air can hold more moisture than cold air. In New England, precipitable water values were at record highs for this time of year.

No wonder. Much of the moisture feed for this current storm is coming straight from the Caribbean Sea. That's a lot of warm, moist air. No wonder the precipitation has been so heavy, and the air has been so warm and humid today.

Everybody in the Northeast is getting heavy precipitation and that will largely continue through tonight, and in some areas, well into Saturday.

One river of heavy rain has been moving today from southwestern New England into central western and central Massachusetts, central New Hampshire and into Maine.

Here in Vermont, the rain hasn't been quite as heavy, but it's still substantial. (Burlington, on top of its record high temperature, today had its wettest January 11th on record. - 0.64 inches of precipitation as of late afternoon and still counting.)

Add to it this warm, humid, which melts snow at the fastest rate possible, and no wonder pretty much all the snow has disappeared from valleys and melted substantially from mountains. And no wonder flooding is a problem.

Now, of course, that long promised sharp cold front is entering the region as of Friday evening.  The cold air will blast in near the surface of the earth first, and the warm air will linger a bit higher overhead.

That moisture feed from the Caribbean is continuing tonight, but will glide up and over that onrushing cold air.

We're still looking at the rain changing to freezing rain from northwest to southeast across the region tonight. Since temperatures will be crashing so fast, any standing water will freeze, too. It's called a flash freeze and you can get why.

Over New York, and the northwest corner of Vermont, the precipitation will be quicker to change to sleet and then snow overnight and into Saturday as the cold air really establishes itself. Which means the forecast is still on track for only relatively light icing from freezing rain tonight,  followed by four to as much as 10 inches of sleet and snow accumulation throught Saturday.

Further south in Vermont, forecasters are still expected a longer period of freezing rain before the sleet and snow come in on Saturday. There still might be enough ice accumulation to cause scattered power failures and broken tree limbs.

If you were planning on traveling anywhere in eastern New York, Vermont or most of the rest of New England Saturday morning, don't bother. Between the ice left over from the flash freeze tonight, the occasionally heavy freezing rain, sleet and snow coming down, increasing north winds, blowing snow and crashing temperatures, it will be downright scary out there.

Things will slowly start to improve Saturday afternoon and night, but the temperatures will keep crashing. falling well below zero Saturday night - somewhere near 10 below.

It'll stay cold during the first half of the week and then start moderating some - but not up to 60 degrees again!

The computer models are still disagreeing about a possible storm sometime around the Tuesday to Thursday time frame. Some of the models keep insisting on a substantial snowstorm for our area, while others are saying, meh! just some light stuff.

Let's just get through this storm and deal with any other problems afterwards. Dizzy yet?

I do have to say what I keep saying: That extreme weather in one location is no proof of global warming or the lack thereof. However, we here in Vermont have had an oddly large number of completely off the rails weather events over the past few years, and they seem to be coming faster and more furiously. Today just added to that growing list.

That seems to be happeneing in many other parts of the world, too. That, trend, of an increasing frequency of bizarre weather events, IS consistent with climate change. I do think this string of oddball weather happenings is a symptom.

 

Wild Weather Ride In Vermont, Northeast Through Tomorrow

Thirty-six hours ago, there was close to a foot of snow on
the ground in my St. Albans, Vermont yard. After our
mega thaw over the past 24 hours, it's mostly back. And
tonight and tomorrow, most of the lost snow is forecast
to be replaced by a new winter storm. 

I was stunned when I got up at my St. Albans home, in northwestern Vermont when I got up this morning.  

There was nearly a foot of snow on the ground here early Wednesday morning. Virtually all of it is gone this morning.

The tempeature when I went outside with the dogs was in the low 50s, nearly 80 degrees warmer than what it was when I took the dogs out this past Sunday morning.

If you think that is wild, the dizzying swings in weather and temperature are only just beginning.

Flood watches that were in effect for southern and central New England have been extended north today all the way through Vermont. It's warmer out there than some forecasters thought, and a big slug of rain was moving into the state early this morning.

River us is starting to break up, and there's a real threat of ice jams and flooding upstream from those jams into early Saturday morning. Already, as of 8 a.m. a flood warning was up for the Ausable River in the Adirondacks as heavy rain had already moved in there. Melting snow and the likelihood of ice jams prompted that warning

The weather will remain very trying to say the least through Saturday, and beyond, really. Near record highs today - just four days after the record lows last Sunday - are still expected to be replaced by heavy snow, dangerous icing conditions and another blast of Arctic air.

Latest snowfall foredast map from the National Weather
Service in South Burlington, Vermont. Heaviest snow still
looks like it will be to the northwest, (yellow and orange
colors) with four to ten inches there.

(No wonder I had to call in sick to work today: This yo-yo weather is enough to make anybody ill.)

It was remarkably warm this morning. Bennington, and Rutland, Vermont were up to 58 degrees already as of 8 a.m. Burlington was at 54, just one degree shy of the record high for the date. Normally frigid Massena, New York, in the northwestern corner of that state, touched 58 early this morning.  

The temperatures will stay mild through much of the day, along with the moderate to heavy rain hence the flood warning.

Many areas will get an inch of rain today. A few places might close in on two inches. In southern New England, where flood watches are also up, there could even be thunderstorms mixed in, adding to the heavy rain totals.

But that Arctic cold front invading the very wet storm that's affecting the Northeast means business. When the front hits wherever you are, you'll know it. The temperature will absolutely drop like a rock.

When the cold air hits your location, the rain will change to freezing rain, then sleet, then snow. Timing depends on when the front reaches you. The best guess is late afternoon in northern New York, evening in Vermont's Champlain Valley, after 7 p.m around Montpelier and closer to 10 p.m. around Rutland. Give or take a couple of hours on all these time estimates.

Could even be tricky for some evening commuters this evening over New York and possibly, just possibly far northwestern Vermont.

Meteorologists with the National Weather Service and elsewhere say it still looks like the period of freezing rain and sleet won't last as long in northern New York and northwestern Vermont as it will further south, so I don't expect much in the way of damage to trees or power lines there.

This will be a flash freeze, however. All that water from today's soaking rain will freeze very quickly and remain in place, making a mess out of roads, sidewalks and everything else for that matter.

Further south into southern Vermont and in central New England the risk of power outages and tree damage from ice accumulations continues into Saturday.   Forecasters have backed off just a bit on expected ice accumulations from this storm, but the danger of power trouble is still there.

Forecasted snow amounts haven't changed too much. Four to eight inches is still likely by the end of the day Saturday across northern New York and northwestern Vermont. Progressively less will fall as you head toward the southeast, with total snw accumulations by Saturday evening around four to six inches in central Vermont and as little as an inch in far southern Vermont.

As always, this is subject to change. Especially with this storm. There's such a wide range of temperatures with this over a short distance that any subtle change in the track of the storm could have a big effect on accumulations, and whether you get more snow, freezing rain, or plain rain.

The temperature will keep going down, down, down even after this storm departs. It'll be in the teens at best while it's still snowing on Saturday, and be well below zero by Sunday morning. Many places early Sunday will be close to 10 below, or about 65 degrees colder than this morning.

The wild temperature swings continue. Talk about weather whiplash!

And maybe the storm sytems, too. Computer models are disagreeing about the weather during the upcoming mid-week. The European models dump big snowstorm on New England, including Vermont at midweek. The American models say it's going to snow at midweek, but it won't be a huge deal. Stay tuned on that one.

Two More Videos Showing How Terrifying This Week's California Mudslides Were

A firefighter on the roof f a house engulfed in mud
and rocks and the mudslides and debris flows in
southern California this week. Photo by
Marcio Jose San Sanchez/AP

There's a lot of videos out there of the terrible mudslides and debris flows in California earlier this week, and more keep popping up.

At last report, 17 people had died in the mudslides and eight others were still missing. While the rain has stopped and is not expected to start again for more than a week, the damage is clearly done.

It'll take a long time to recover from the worst of the mess in California.

Here's one video of a mud and rockslide shoving a car own a road in Burbank, California. The occupants of the car are reported to have escaped without injury. Video via the Weather Network:



Next video is the increasing terror as the mudslides engulfs Montecito, California in the pre-dawn hours Monday. At first, the person taking the video is outdoors, warning a van driver to get out now because the debris flow is coming.

Then, he goes inside, while the house rapidly fills up with mud:

Godawful Mess Coming To New England Friday And Saturday: Get Ready

The National Weather Service in South Burlington
has this first guess of snow accumulations late
Friday night through Saturday. Orange areas
coudl get five to as much as 12 inches of snow

Well, this has surely been a super active to start to the new year both nationally and around here in New England, and it shows no signs of letting up.

Another lousy mess of a storm is coming and this one could really be disruptive.

If you live in the Northeast, including almost anywhere in New England, including here in Vermont, expect heavy rain, flooding, dangerous ice accumulations and/or heavy snow, depending on exactly where you live.

I'll tease out the details, as they stand now, after I get into the big picture here, so we can understand what's going on.

One wave of the storm is already causing locally  heavy snow, strong winds, blowin snow and even some blizzard conditions to parts of the northern Plains. High winds are buffeting the central and southern Plains.

Wave Two is about to start getting its act together near the Gulf Coast, and this is the one that will spread a variety of misery from Tennessee through New England and southeastern Canada.

This storm has a lot of wet air to reinforce it as it draws tons of moisture from the Gulf of Mexico.

Thus, floods risks and heavy preciptiation will make its way north from the Tennessee Valley into New England.

National Weather Service forecasts for ice accumulation
later Friday night and Saturday. Areas in orange and
especially red are at risk for damage to trees and
power lines. 

This Thursday morning, we're starting out with our well-advertised January thaw, as temperatures by mid morning were already 40 degrees or a little higher than that. Temperatures will climb well into the 40s today, stay there tonight, and maybe touch 50 for a time on Friday.

No forecaster that I've seen is expecting much in the way of precipitation today, so you're safe. There could be a light rain shower around, but don't get too excited about that.

The rain moves in overnight tonight and continues through most of Friday in New England and eastern New York.

This will occur as the main body of the storm approaches us. Meanwhile, a blast of quite cold air will be rushing in from the west and north to intercept this storm.

The result will be a variety of potentially dangerous weather, and also an exceptionally tricky forecast. I still think no matter how good National Weather Service meteorologists and other New England professionals are, there is still a potential for some forecast busts in parts of the region.

That said, you should be prepared for some rough weather, because broad brush, that appears to be a given.

The rain Friday could cause a few problems with flooding and ice jams across northern New York, and the northern two thirds of Vermont, and New Hampshire, but at this point, the feeling is those kinds of issues won't be too widespread. The existing snow cover will absorb some of the rain.

Southern New England - including the southernmost two counties in Vermont, is in the crosshairs for flooding, however. The rain will be heavier down there - potentially as much as four inches of it by Saturday. Add to that the snowmelt from the snowstorms over the past week and clogged drains and ice from the recent frigid weather and you've got yourself a real problem. Temperatures as high as 60 degrees in southeastern New England would make the snow melt very fast, too.

 Further north, the thinking among the meteorologists who are much smarter than me suggest the cold air will fully engulf the storm in a stripe through the St. Lawrence Valley of New York, the central and northern Adirondacks, maybe the northwestern tip of Vermont near St. Albans, and southern Quebec could get quite a bit of snow out of this

As the cold air rushes in to these areas Friday night, precipitation will probably go through a period of freezing rain Friday night, but the ice accumulation likely won't be bad enough to cause widespread problems with downed trees and power lines. The snow is forecast to continue through the day Saturday, with perhaps five to 12 inches of new accumulation, possibly locally more in these areas.

Now, in central and southern Vermont, central New Hampshire, parts of Maine, and the Capital District of New York, it's beginning to look like a battle line will form between the cold air rushing in from the northwest, and the warm, humid air the storm is bringing from the south.

The cold air will undercut the warm air, but milder air will likely remain in a layer above that. All this sets the stage for the risk the the freezing rain will last many hours Friday night and Saturday, and accumulate enough to wreck branches and trees and do a number on the power lines. Be prepared for power failures in these areas with this storm.

Be aware, the areas expecting the most snow, or the most ice could shift with subsequent forecasts. Nobody is really out of the woods at this point

As you might expect, winter storm watches are up for all of Vermont and eastern New York. 

What makes this worse is the cold, Arctic air will eventually flood in as the storm departs Saturday night. The upcoming cold wave probably won't be quite as bad as what we saw earlier this month. However, with high temperatures just near 10 on Sunday and in the single numbers to low teens below zero Sunday night, power outages can be especially dangerous.

So yeah, we have a good mess on our hands, it looks like. Plus, there might be another storm around Tuesday, but that one definitely looks weaker and the precipitation would come down as all snow. And the snow - at least from now - looks like it will be on the light side. However, if things get together just right, the Tuesday or Wednesday storm could overachieve, Stay tuned!

Running Hot And Cold: Sahara Snow, Australian Heat

Snow mixes with sand last week in the Sahara Desert in Algeria.

The United States isn't the only place in the world getting off the rails weather this winter.

If you want two examples,  I got 'em: Snow in the Sahara Desert, and record heat in Australia.

Snow fell last week in the Atlas Mountains region of Algeria, on the edge of the Sahara desert. An unusual weather pattern brought down some cold air and moisture from Europe

It turns out that snow in the high elevation area of Algeria is fairly rare, but not unheard of. It has snowed there three or four times in the past 40 years, according to reports. That snow sure is pretty on those sand dunes, though, as you can tell by the photo in this post.

Meanwhile, in Australia, it's now summer. It often does get hot in Australia, but a heat wave over the past few days was pretty much as bad as it can get. Record temperatures as high as 117 degrees in parts of the nation melted asphalt one one highway and apparently killed hundreds of bats, which could not take the heat.

Temperatures near Perth tied records for the hottest ever recorded there.

The hot spell has since abated, at least for now. Below is a brief video showing the bizarre effects of driving on a road on which the asphalt is beginning to melt:

California Storm Claims At Least 13 Lives, System To Cause Trouble All The Way To Northeast

A California house buried in mud yesterday after heavy
rains hit areas denuded by wildfires last month. 

The mudslides and debris flows spawned by the torrential rains in areas of California that experienced wildfires just a month ago has now claimed 13 lives, with other people still missing.

The rain has mercifully let up, with little if any rain expected over the next week.

But the damage is done, with incredible destruction in some communities, especially around the city of Montecito, where a wall of mud, boulders, trees and debris swept through town, carrying homes, cars and people with it.

At least 25 other people were injured in the disaster, according to the Los Angeles Times. As of late yesterday afternoon, at least 300 people remained trapped in their homes, but were safe for now. However, rescue crews haven't even been able to get into a more remote area in the debris flow zone to check for people who might be trapped.

The wet weather extended well inland. Las Vegas, Nevada had its wettest January day on record Tuesday,  with 1.33 inches of precipitation.

There's some pretty incredible videos of the destruction at the bottom of this post.

The storminess that hit California is making a cross-country trek across the United States, and will cause havoc in many areas, including Vermont. I'm not expecting anything like California, of course, but it's still going to get messy. At least that's the way it looks now.

Today, a vast area from Montana to Wisconsin and south to Kansas is under a variety of winter storm watches, warnings and advisories. The same is true for many parts of the Rocky Mountains. This is all part of a first wave of storminess that's heading northeastward through the central part of the United States.

This first wave will push a warm front through us here in northern New England tonight. Later on tonight, expect light, but messy precipitation - sleet, snow, freezing rain and rain.

Remember that the ground is quite frigid after that long subzero siege that just ended a few days ago. Which means even if there's plain rain where you are, it could still easily freeze on pavement. Could be a tricky commute to work in the morning.

Forecasters don't expect much precipitation during the day Thursday here in Vermont, but a real January thaw will surge in. By afternoon, it'll be in the 40s everywhere, maybe even touching 50 in the warmest valleys.

Meanwhile, the main storm system will be taking shape near the central Gulf Coast, and that one will start to head toward the northeast, toward us in New England specifically. This storm will have lots of moisture with it, so whatever precipitation comes down will probably come down pretty hard at times.

And there's the rub. We don't know what kind of precipitation we're going to get from this thing. It'll be a race between a cold front coming in from the northwest and the storm coming up from the south.

Which one wins will determine which type of precipitation we get. If the cold front gets here first, there will be an ugly mix of sleet, freezing rain and snow. If the storm gets here first, it's rain, which raises the possibility of flooding.

Either way we lose.

The forecast thinking now is rain will move in amid mild temperatures Thursday night and continue most of Friday. That could spell trouble with ice jams in rivers, and street flooding from ice-clogged drains.

Then - again, this is what forecasters are expecting at the moment - the cold air will come in from northwest to southeast Friday night, giving us the ugly mix of precipitation Friday night and Saturday.

This forecast has a huge bust potential. I really don't think the predictions will go exactly the way I've just outlined, but nobody really knows for sure which way it might go. Stay tuned on this one.

Meteorologists are more confident that precipitation will go over to snow later Saturday or Saturday night, then taper off. It also looks like we've got another couple of Arctic cold surges coming in, starting Sunday.

The good news is the cold doesn't look like it will be as intense as what we had the first week in January. The temperature will probably go below zero again but it won't go into the 20s below or anything like that.

This cold blast won't last as long as the previous one, either. It'll start Sunday, and begin to end probably four days later.

Here are some of those videos from California: You might want to turn off the sound in the first one. The narrator talks and talks and swears, too. NSFW:



The Santa Barbara Independent also has dramatic views of the disaster:


And here's the CBS overview of the storm: