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| USGS data from early this morning showed the Otter Creek in Center Rutland Vermont zooming rapidly upward past flood stage early this morning. |
Overall, the flooding in parts of southern and central Vermont is, if anything, worse than anticipated.
A line of thunderstorms that was earlier part of an area of severe thunderstorms and tornado warnings made it into western New England, including southwestern Vermont earlier this morning, enhancing the rain and making Rutland and Windsor Counties so far at least, the epicenter of flooding from this current episode.
The thunderstorms weren't severe by the time they hit Vermont - no high winds and certainly no tornado threat. But they retained their heavy rain and up to two inches of rain fell on saturated ground and melting snow in just a short period of time.
There are flooding reports coming out of the area. A driveway is washed out along Route 4A in West Rutland. My sister Lynn, who lives in West Rutland said three thunderstorms blustered through overnight, each containing very torrential rain. She confirmed reports that Route 4 was under water near the West Rutland Price Chopper supermarket. Lynn also said water appeared to be flowing into a basement on Route 4A.
Route 133 in Middletown Springs was blocked by floodwaters, as was a section of Route 30 in Wells.
Also, Route 7, a major commuter route, was closed this morning by flooding at Post Road in Rutland Town. Route 107 was closed by flooding in Stockbridge, as was Route 100 in Rochester.
Since that batch of heavy rain was heading northeast early this morning, flooding will probably worsen during the morning in parts of central and eastern Vermont. We'll have to watch Windsor, Washington and Orange counties in particular. Listen for flood and flash flood warnings, and do what the warnings say. Don't drive over flooded roads!
Not everyone in Vermont saw flooding. As usual, it was hit and miss. For instance, where I live in St. Albans, Vermont, it certainly rained overnight. But there was no sign of flooding around my place. The little brook that runs past my house had a healthy flow, but it was far, far below the level where it would cause trouble.
The rain will become more showery as the day progresses, but there still might be pockets of briefly heavy rain after that mass of thunderstorms exits eastern Vermont later this morning.
I think by then, the threat of flooding on smaller streams will begin to diminish, but runoff from the rain and melting snow will keep the larger rivers rising. With all that heavy rain in Rutland and Bennington counties this morning, the Otter Creek will be a problem.
USGS data this morning shows the Otter Creek rising extremely fast and it had past flood stage by early this morning. We'll need to watch other rivers across Vermont today for flooding as well.
The National Weather Service early this morning also issued flood warnings for the Mad and Dog rivers in central Vermont, which were rapidly rising toward flood stage early this morning.
The best guess is most of the major rivers in Vermont such as the Lamoille, Winooski and Missisquoi will crest this afternoon and tonight.
By the way, there will probably be some snow showers again in the high elevations overnight, but accumulations won't amount to too much. Tuesday will be a windy and cool day.
After a break in the weather midweek, we'll have to watch another potentially very wet storm toward the end of the week and the weekend. It looks like we in Vermont might get even more into the warm side of the storm than is the case with today's system.
That raises the possibillity of more thunderstorms with heavy rain instead of a more gentle, steady rain. It's not set in stone if this will happen. Things could definitely change. But there's at least the potential for another flood threat at the end of the week.
SEVERE WEATHER
Those thunderstorms that caused havoc in the southern half of Vermont this morning were part of a line of severe storms that got going in the Ohio yesterday and moved to the East Coast this morning.
There was a very damaging tornado in Shelby, Ohio, and numerous tornado warnings and reports of wind damage in Pennsylvania, western New York, New Jersey and on down the coast to Florida. There was even a tornado warning in Philadelphia for a time early this morning.
There was also a report of wind damage from thunderstorms as far north as Warren County, New York, which is immediately to the west of Rutland County, Vermont. As of 6:30 this morning the thunderstorms were causing an enormous amountof lightning in southern New England. Luckily, those thunderstorms should move east of Boston by the time the Boston Marathon starts today.
It still looks like there will be another widespread outbreak of severe weather and possible tornadoes in the middle and southeastern quarter of the nation Wednesday through Friday.
Some videos:
Tornado=wrecked fire station in Mississippi
New view of Franklin, Texas after Saturday's tornado
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