A Big Change To Wet And Chilly May In Vermont, Northeast

Frankly, I didn't appreciate the rain, mixed with a bit of sleet, as I did some volunteer spring cleaning of a rural, historic cemetery in West Rutland, Vermont Sunday, but it looks like we'll all have to get used to it. 

It was a very wet, windy commute this morning in St.
Albans, Vermont. There are frequent chances of rain coming
up for the next couple of weeks in Vermont.

That's because we're entering a long, long period that will mostly feature cool, cloudy and often wet weather quite possibly lasting into mid-May.

Not every day during this period will be gloomy and chilly, but most will be.

Let's break it down into details:
Today will be one last warm day, at least for most of us.

A warm front pushed through overnight, and it was near the Canadian border early this Monday morning, Rain was falling in northern Vermont, along with northern New York, plus New Hampshire and much of Maine.

The rain will taper off for awhile, except in Quebec and northern Maine for awhile today. Temperatures will probably make it to 70 degrees west of the Green Mountains, but it will get progressively cooler as you head east toward the Maine coast.

That huge storm we've been talking about the past few days is still swirling in the middle of the nation, even managing to squeeze out a few inches of snow in places like South Dakota and Minnesota.

The storm caused a really big, bad, disruptive blizzard in western Kansas Sunday, tornadoes in Texas and very severe flooding in Missouri that killed at least 14 people.

Anyway, this storm's expansive cold front is pressing east, and is destined to put a wide area of the Northeastern United States under threat of severe weather later today and this evening.

At this point, it looks like the best chances of severe storms would extend from western and central New York, through Pennsylvania and down into Maryland, Virginia and West Virginia.

In this entire area, strong, damaging winds, large hail and even a few tornadoes are a good bet today.

Here in northern New York and Vermont, a line of possibly severe storms will get going in central New York and head east. These storms will probably be on a weakening trend as they get into Vermont's Champlain Valley this evening.

There will still be a chance of damaging wind gusts in a few places west of the Green Mountains from these storms this evening. They'll keep weakening as they head off toward New Hampshire, so eastern areas are far less likely to get nailed by these.

Everybody will get a round of rain from these, though tonight.

Tuesday, and to somewhat a lesser extent Wednesday, that swirl of a storm now in the middle of the country will help create low pressure in the upper levels of the atmosphere here in the Northeast, so occasional showers and cooler weather will be a good bet.

There's probably a break in the weather Thursday with some sun and near normal temperatures, but a very wet storm is set to arrive from the south late in the week. That'll create quite a lot of rain Friday and Saturday.

That storm will complete a pattern change in which a deep trough of low pressure in the atmosphere sets up over the Northeast.

For us in Vermont and surrounding areas, that means a prolonged era of cool, showery weather. This type of pattern usually gives us lots of days with chilly rains, mixed with just a small number of days that have partial sunshine and temperatures just a little cooler than normal.

We had a taste of summer weather in April, but it looks like we'll have to wait until at least the middle of May or later to bring back out the shorts and t-shirts and sunglasses.