Sept. Weather Pattern Gorgeous For New England; But For Rest Of Nation, Not So Much

Gorgeous sunset over northwestern Vermont last Sunday. This is a photo
I took from a hot air balloon.

We here in Vermont and the rest of the New England have been blessed by what has so far been a gorgeous September.

With few exceptions, we've had lots of sunny, pleasant days. Temperatures have generally been a tad cooler than normal, but not by much. Aside from a couple windy days that brought down a few branches, nothing bad has happened. 

This pattern is going to continue, except with some re-arrangements that will make warmer than normal temperatures more likely into early October. There will be episodes of rain and or wind thrown in for the next couple of weeks, but the sunshine seems like it might dominate.

This weather situation has been great for us. For much of the rest of the nation, not so much. On two occasions already this month, the pattern has steered two tropical systems into the United States, with destructive results.

After leveling the northern Bahamas, Hurricane Dorian sideswiped coastal North Carolina, causing a major storm surge flood on Oracoake Island. Then, as we've been talking about all week, Tropical Storm Imelda unleashed another epic flood disaster in Houston and other parts of eastern Texas.

The pattern has also emphasized storminess in the central and northern Plains. Record flooding hitting parts of South Dakota and Iowa earlier this month, and tornadoes swept through Sioux Falls, South Dakota.

It's not getting any better out in that part of the nation. The remnants of Isabel, plus moisture from tropical storms off the west coast of Mexico, combined with a cold front, are expected to unleash more dangerous flash floods today in the central United States, especially in parts of Kansas and Missouri.

Flash flooding and a possible tornado hit eastern North Dakota overnight. Meanwhile, the remnants of now-Hurricane Lorena, which is near Baja California, could unleash flash floods and severe thunderstorms in Arizona early next week.

A big, fat ridge of high pressure mostly centered in the east-central United States has been responsible for this pattern. Under this ridge, in the South and Tennessee Valleys, heat has broken hundreds of records and many cities look like they will have their hottest September on record.

(The fact that the high pressure ridge in the jet stream has been generally centered just west and south of New England has allowed cooler pushes of air to sneak down the front side of the ridge through Quebec and Ontario and on into New England).

With the ridge in the east, there's a corresponding dip in the jet stream over the western United States. That has produced some rare thunderstorms in places like Seattle this month.

There are signs that the jet stream dip in the West could sharpen in the coming days, opening up the possibillity of unusually strong rain storms for this early in the season, and an odd amount of early season snow in parts of the Rockies.

So yeah, us Vermonters can really rejoice in the great weather we've had,  considering we've been almost surrounded by all kinds of yucky and even dangerous conditions.

Enjoy it while you can, because I have an adage that has always worked: No great weather in Vermont goes unpunished. We will get our comeuppance soon enough. What form that will take is anybody's guess.

NOAA's Trump Sycophants Even Worse Now. Meanwhile Scientists Stand Up For Science

After published reports that Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross threatened
to fire NOAA employees who issued accurate forecasts that contradicted
Trump, I think this guy has gotta go.

An update to that awful story I wrote about a few days ago regarding NOAA's top brass throwing National Weather Service meteorologists under the bus for being accurate forecasters and contradicting King Trump.

According to the New York Times, scummy Commerce Secretary and Trump plaything Wilbur Ross threatened to fire meteorologists and others who contradicted Trump.

As commerce secretary, Ross oversees NOAA and by extention the National Weather Service.  

Apparently, accurate forecasts that warn people of danger are less important that massaging Trump's ego.

Ross denies the New York Times report.  But Ross his lied before, so I don't trust him.

If you don't recall what started thsi whole mess: A couple of Sundays ago, Trump mistakenly said that Alabama was in the path of dangerous Hurricane Dorian. There had been some forecasts that had suggested this could be the case several days earlier, but by the time Trump made his statement, Alabama was off the table. Forecasters knew that state was safe from Dorian.

The Birmingham, Alabams office of the National Weather Service issued a tweet saying that Trump got it wrong: Alabama was safe. These meteorologists did this to avoid unnecessary panic in the state.

This is how the Trump people think: The New York Times said a senior administration official who asked not to be identified accused the Birmingham meteorologists of issuing their correction tweet because they were motivated to embarass the president and not out of concern over safety.

Yep, everything is apparently about the president. Anyone who does anything either does it to help or hurt Trump, seems to be the thinking. There's supposedly no other motivation.

In its report, the New York Times said Ross phoned Neil Jacobs, the acting administrator of NOAA and ordered him to fix the agency's perceived contradiction of the president.

Meanwhile, fellow scientists are enthusiastically standing by the Birmingham NWS meteorlogists, which is a good thing. They're standing up for scientific accuracy and ethics. They're certainly not happy with Jacobs. There happens to be a major meteorology conference going on this week in Huntsville, Alabama, and Jacobs is scheduled to speak there today. That ought to be interesting!

At that conference in Huntsville on Monday, attendees gave the Birmingham meteorlogists a long standing ovation.

By the way, the New York Times article is definitely worth the read because it also summarizes how often Trump denies science to soothe his own ego.

As we've said here previously, this is very dangerous because the public needs to trust agencies like the National Weather Service to provide reliable, accurate, life-saving weather warnings.

Scientists within NOAA are fighting back.

NOAA"s acting chief scientist Craig McLean has said he will investigate why his supervisors at NOAA backed Trump's claim over its own forecasters.

In an email obtained by NBC News, McLean wrote that the unsigned NOAA statement that threw the Alabama meteorologists under the bus "inappropriately and incorrectly contracted the (National Weather Service) forecaster."

We hope this investigations sheds more light on this scandal.

Meanwhile, I know this won't happen, but if Ross had an ounce of dignity, which he doesn't, he'd resign.

Dorian, Other Tropical Trouble, Stormy Vermont/New England

Complete devastation in the Bahamas after Hurricane Dorian

It wasn't the most pleasant of mornings to wake up to in St. Albans, Vermont. When I took the dogs out, winds were gusting to about 40 mph, taking down some small branches. It was thundering, and then rained right after the dogs came back in.

It will be a relatively stormy day in Vermont and New England. Nothing like Hurricane Dorian, though. More on that further down.

Most of the showers and storms in the northwestern half of Vermont and into New York will be this rnorning and early afternoon.  A couple storms might be on the strong side in this area, but nothing really severe is expected.

In fact, as of shortly before 9 a.m. a strong storm was right near me in St. Albans. There's fairly frequent lightning and the National Weather Service in South Burlington says the storm has some gusts to maybe 40 mph or a little more with it. A similar strong storm was about to move into Burlington at that hour.

There's better instability further east, so as the weather moves across Vermont and into the rest of New England, some strong to severe storms are possible in the southeastern half of Vermont this afternoon.

These chances of severe storms extend across much of New Hampshire, southwestern Maine, southern New England and southeastern New York. Most of the risk in this entire area is from strong straight line winds. However, there could be a supercell or two, notes the NOAA's Storm Prediction Center, leading to a very slight chance of a tornado.

All this goes away later today and tonight and the weather looks calm for us here in Vermont for the next several days starting tomorrow. That calm weather forecast isn't true for everywhere in the United States, as we well know.

HURRICANE DORIAN

After causing its terrible destruction in the Bahamas, Hurricane Dorian continues to limp northward. Tropical storm and hurricane warnings were finally all ended for the Bahamas this morning. Recovery can begin there, but it's going to be a long and painful road. Aerial views of places like the Abaco Islands show total devastation.

The official death toll is seven, but people are sure there are many more casualties.  Conditions are only now getting calm enough to search. Video is at the bottom of this post.

Dorian was positioned about 95 miles east of Daytona Beach, Florida early this morning, says the National Hurricane Center. Top winds were down to about 105 mph, which is still terrible, but not like the 185 mph it had in the Bahamas.

The hurricane, as is typical for ones heading north like this, has gotten larger in size.  That means gusty winds, high tides and occasionally heavy rain is sweeping across northeastern Florida.

Dorian is still expected to skirt the coasts of Georgia and the Carolinas through Friday, and might touch shore in the Outer Banks of North Carolina Friday. So it's still a pretty serious threat through the end of the week.

It looks like the most damage from Dorian from here on out will be storm surges and high tides, especially in the Carolinas. 

After that, Dorian will finally accelerate off to the northeast, missing New England but probably hitting parts of Nova Scotia Newfoundland as a strong storm losing its tropical characteristics but still having top winds of 70 mph or more.

OTHER TROPICAL TROUBLE

We're in the peak of the Atlantic hurricane season, so there's a lot of other stuff going on out there besides Dorian.

Tropical Storm Fernand formed in the western Gulf of Mexico yesterday. It won't get that big, but could cause flooding in the next day or two as it comes ashore in northeastern Mexico.

Tropical Storm Gabrielle got going this morning way out over the open central Atlantic Ocean. It, too, probably won't get very strong and poses no immediate threat to land.

Another system near Bermuda might form into a tropical storm in a couple of days. Forecasters are also watching  disturbance come off the west coast of Africa into the Atlantic which could eventually spell trouble.

Videos:

Footage from helicopter shows complete destruction:



View from a hurricane hunter plane inside the eye of Dorian during its peak: