Big Storminess Of Past Week Kinda, Sorta Calming Down In U.S, Including Here In Vermont

A mother and her four year old kid managed to
survive this tree falling on their car during
high winds yesterday in Milton, Massachusetts.

Well, that was quite the windy day here in Vermont, wasn't it.

As advertised, things weren't quite as bad in the Green Mountain State as elsewhere, but it was impressive. Damage was widely scattered but noticeable: A couple barns lost their roofs, trees and branches fell everywhere, including on a few houses.

Power was out for thousands across Vermont yesterday, but most of us have their juice back. There were just a few outages left here and there as of 8:30 a.m. today, mostly in Bennington County, where winds were arguably the strongest in the state on Monday.

Most low elevations in Vermont had peak gusts in the 45 to 55 mph range, but this storm was really something in the mountains here in Vermont and in the rest of the Northeast.

It's always windier - especially during storms - in the mountains, but this was really something.  Thank goodness these screaming winds above 3,500 feet or so in elevation had some trouble mixing down to the valleys.

Whiteface Mountain, New York had a gust of 107 mph. A large communications tower on Sugarloaf Mountain in Maine collapsed in 100 mph gusts. The top of Mount Washington reached 171 mph, the strongest wind on record for February on the New Hampshire peak.

Back here in Vermont, the top of Mount Mansfield reached 124 mph, which I think might be some sort of record, I'm not sure.

It's still windy today, but not nearly as bad. There won't be any more wind damage, but the gusts will keep us feeling cold. Temperatures will only make it into the teens this afternoon, and with wind gusts as high as 30 mph, wind chills will certainly be below zero.

The weather here in Vermont and most of the rest of the nation will not be as dramatic over the next week as it has in the past week, but there's still plenty of action to talk about.

If you were looking for an early spring this year, it ain't happening. A guess that stupid rodent in Pennsylvania was wrong back on February 2.

High winds, drifting snow, and blowing snow obscured the landscape
in Kassan, Minnesota over the weekend, trapping cars. Persistent
cold and record amounts of February snow in that region are
raising fears of flooding later in the spring. 

The weather pattern favors below normal temperatures for almost all of the nation through about March 10. Many areas after that date will stay cold.

The epicenter of the cold is going to stay where it has all month -- in the northeastern Rockies and northern Plains. There will be quite a few cities and towns there that will end up having their coldest February on record.

Some examples: Cut Bank, Montana, near the Canadian border, is running an incredible 28 degrees below normal so far this month, and the intense cold there will continue through the first week of March. Cut Bank has had 16 days this month where the temperature stayed below zero all day, and only two days this month failed to get below zero.

Yeah, I'm complaining about the cold in Vermont, but I've got nothing on Cut Bank.

In addition to the intense cold, the Dakotas, Minnesota, Iowa and Wisconsin have had record or near record amounts of snow in February. With forecasts of a delayed start to the melt season,  there's fears the weather will turn to spring all at once later on, causing an abrupt melt and severe flooding.

People in this region are already whispering about 1997, when a massive flood after a snowy winter and a late spring unleashed a devastating inundation of Grand Forks, North Dakota.

Back here in Vermont, it will be cold, but not to the extreme of the northern Plains. After a couple days that will be about 20 degrees colder than normal, we'll briefly warm up to something close to normal by Friday and Saturday. Then it will get cold again, probably until at least around March 10.

Things could change of course, but right now I'm not seeing any really big storms in the next week or so. Yes, there will be a little snow in southern Vermont Wednesday or Wednesday night, and maybe a little snow, rain or a mix Saturday. But unless things shift dramatically, forecasters see not big dumps of snow or torrential rains or super wind storms for now.