Monday Vermont Update: Icy Start, Windy Day, Power Outages Already

Workers make emergency repairs to the roof of this Milton, Vermont
house damaged by strong winds last October. Winds strong enough
to cause structure damage, and lot of tree and power line
trouble are likely today along the western slopes of the Green Mountains.

Another slug of freezing rain came through much of Vermont early this Monday morning, adding another layer of glaze to everything out there.

Kinda depressing for mid-April.

Now the wind is picking up, as expected. In some areas the ice hasn't melted from the trees, or won't have melted yet when the wind cranks up. That will just increase the chances of power failures.

High wind warnings of course remain in effect across the western slopes of the Green Mountains today.

As of 10 a.m., there were already more than 3,000 homes and businesses wthout power mostly in western Vermont.

Wind gusts reported as of 10 a.m. include 64 mph at Mendon in eastern Rutland County and 58  mph at Breadloaf, in eastern Addison County,  Underhill Center has reported a gust to 54 mph. Winds will probably increase more over the next few hours.

Ice from overnight freezing rain glazed everything, including my budding
lilac bush, in my St. Albans, Vermont yard this morning.

To give you an idea of how the wind is screaming ferociously several thousand feet overhead, a wind gust of 94 mph was reported early this morning at the summit of Whiteface Mountain, New York

The eastern slopes of the entire range of the Green Mountains is under the gun for damaging winds today.

Here's how this works: As mentioned, there's incredible winds several thousand feet above the surface, coming at us from the southeast.  Lower level winds are lighter, but are still coming from the southeast.

These lighter winds go up the eastern slopes of the Green Mountains and sort of overshoot the tops of the ridge lines. These winds sort of "grab" pieces of the much stronger winds raging higher up, and then send those strong gusts tumbling down the westenr slopes of the Greens.

Winds could reach 75 mph in gusts along the western slopes in Rutland and Addison counties. Winds will probably be a bit lighter along the western slopes in northern Vermont, but I will not be the least bit surprised to see gusts in the 60 to 65 mph range in eastern Chittenden and Franklin counties, in towns like Underhill, Cambridge and Bakersfield.

The National Weather Service in South Burlington is thinking today's winds will not be as widespread as those in late October, which caused lots of structural and tree damage in western Vermont all the way to Lake Champlain.

These types of storms are usually confined to the immediate western slopes of the Green Mountains, with exceptions being last October's storm and the very damaging one in Rutland back in April, 2007.

Still, this time, we unfortunately do have a shot of damaging winds extending further west than the immediate slopes. It really depends upon how much force the winds could muster as they push westward

There is a temperature inversion today, a situation in which in gets warmer with height. That tends to suppress the ability of the strong winds to get too far to the west, away from the Green Mountains.

On the other hand, it is April. Even though it's cloudy, sun's radiation can get through. This can "break" the inverstion, reverting things to the normal situation where it gets colder with height.  If that happens, it's possible, but definitely not certain, - that damaging winds can extend as far west Rutland, Middlebury and Williston.

The downslope winds along the immediate western slopes of the Greens can create breaks in the overcast sometimes. If that happens, more sun can get through and the strong winds can propogate further west. It's unclear if any breaks in the clouds will form.

Only time will tell.

By the way, the strong upper level winds are overhead in much of the Northeast. If thunderstorms in the Mid-Atlantic and southern New England can "grab" these upper level winds and bring them to the surface, there could be local damaging winds in some of those areas, too.