2019 In Vermont: Warm And Quite Wet

April flooding alaong Lake Champlain in Alburg threatened this mobile
home.  Vermont experienced heavy rains through much of 2019,
resulting in two disaster declarations for parts of the state
due to flooding in April and November. 

In the era of climate change, we manage an exception of sorts in 2019:  The year was not among the warmest on record here in Vermont.

It was still warmer than normal, of course.  The mean temperature for the year in Burlington, Vermont was 46.3 degrees, which is 0.5 degrees above the long term average.

A half a degree might not seem like much, but for a period lasting a year, it's a fair amount above average.

Still, this was the first year since 2015 that the yearly average temperature was not among the top ten warmest  on record. You do have to consider, though, that three years in a row, 2016 through 2018 being in the warmest list is unprecedented. That couldn't go on forever.

And, I would remind you again 2019 was warmer than average.  And by the way, eight of the ten warmest years in Burlington have happened since 1998, which echoes global climate trends.

Many climatologists say that climate change is also making our area wetter than it used to be, overall.  Sure, there has been and will be dry years in recent decades, but the overall trend is wetter.

The year that just ended followed that trend. In Burlington, total precipitation for 2019 came to 43.47 inches. That makes 2019 the seventh wettest on record.

While the trend toward wettest isn't as stark as the trend toward warmth in recent years, there is still a noticeable move toward more precipitation in Vermont.  Including 2019, five of the top ten wettest years in Burlington have happened since 1998.

A February 6 ice storm made walking in downtown Burlington,
Vermont a tricky, dangerous exercise. 

The bottom line is, if you think climate change is affecting us here in Vermont, the answer, based on the stats, seems to be yes.

These stats are a better measure of how the footprint of climate change is affecting us than more subjective measures.  Climatologists say that global warming is causing more extreme weather events.

I get the feeling that the weather and climate in Vermont has gotten more extreme than it used to be, but how do you measure that?  Sure, perhaps a storm you experienced recently might have been more intense than you're used to, but is that reality?

In any event, here are the most notable weather events in Vermont during 2019:

January 19-21: An unusually cold, heavy snow.  Burlington had a storm total of 18.6 inches.  During the storm, low level cold air drained south from Quebec, keeping temperatures below zero for the bulk of the storm. It's odd to get that much snow in such cold temperatures. Other sections of Vermont were a little warmer.

Nevertheless, a statewide thaw and heavy rains on January 24 subsequently caused ice jams and local flooding.  Overall, 41.8 inches of snow fell on Burlington during January, making the first month of 2019 the >>>> snowiest on record.

February 5: Burlington reached a daily record high of 53, exceeding the 51 set in 1991. However, freezing rain the next day caused numerous accidents in the Champlain Valley and had some people stranded on Interstate 89 for nearly four hours.

My St. Albans, Vermont driveway awash in heavy early spring snow
on March 23.

March 22-23: Parts of Vermont received a large, late season snowstorm. Burlington got only seven inches of snow, as precipitation there mixed with rain.

However, St. Albans got a foot of heavy, wet snow. The town of Averill in the Northeast Kingdom had four feet of snow on the ground immediately after the storm.  

April 15-16: Significant spring flooding hit Vermont, especially in southern and central parts of the state. A line of strong thunderstorms with heavy rain hit the southern half of Vermont. That, combined with snow melt, led to the flooding.

Six counties in southern and eastern Vermont were declared major disaster areas, as there was $2 million in public infrastructure damage. Most of the damage came in the form of road washouts.

That was state highways. Municipalities had it worse. For instance, there was $1.5 million in damage to roads in just the town of Bethel, says WCAX-TV.

May 14: Late season snow hit parts of northern and high elevation parts of Vermont.  Greensboro and Woodford reported four inches, Danville got 3.5 inches, Plainfield 2.5 inches, 2 inches in Marshfield.

June 20: Flash flooding again caused some damage in parts of central and southern Vermont, though this wasn't nearly as bad as the April storm.  Orwell reported 3.25 inches of rain. Severe storms downed trees in Hartford, Rutland, Mendon and Clarendon.

Extensive damage in Sheldon, Vermont following a severe
July 30 thunderstorm. 

July 30: Damaging thunderstorms struck parts of Vermont in the strongest severe weather outbreak of the year.  Winds gusted to 76 mph in North Hero.

A microburst that traveled from the northern Champlain Islands through Franklin County pushed a Highgate mobile home off its foundation and toppled hundreds of trees. A separate severe thunderstorm caused a lot of damage in the New North End of Burlington, Colchester and Milton.  

A second round of storms on July 31 wasn't as severe, but caused a city-wide power outage in St. Albans and street fooding.

July 31: The mean temperature in Burlington for July ws 74.9 degrees, the third hottest on record. Only 2018 and 1921 were hotter.

August 17: A cluster of severe thunderstorms moved across Rutland and Windsor counties, felling trees near Lake St. Catherine, and in West Rutland, Plymouth and Windsor.  (Windsor would be struck bu a tornado four days later. See next entry.

August 21:  A tornado hit the town of Windham, Vermont. This was the first tornado in the state since 2012.  (Vermont averages one  tornado per year, so this ended a tornado drought of sorts in the Green Mountain State). The Windham tornado was an EF-1 with winds of 105 to 110 mph.  Several homes suffered window, roof and siding damage.

October 1: Strong thunderstorms and heavy rain hit northern sections of the state. Golf ball sized hail fell on Massena, New York and lightning cut power to the St. Albans area. Flooding and washouts occured in some areas. Westfield picked up 3.25 inches of rain, and Wheelock got 3.16 inches.

A large uprooted willow tree on my St. Albans, Vermont property
following the big storm of October 31-November 1.

October 31-November 1:  The most destructive storm since Irene struck Vermont with heavy flooding and strong, damaging winds.  Parts of the Missisquoi and Lamoille rivers had record high crests, with serious flood damage to homes and buildings.

The entire month had been wet, saturating the soil, and then an additional two to five inches of rain fell on western and northern Vermont. East Berkshire reporte 5.26 inches of rain, with 4.85 inches in Enosburg Falls and 4.8 inches in Fletcher.

Numerous roads and culverts were washed out, and much of Vermont was declared a disaster area for the second time in 2019. High winds caused additional substantial damage to power lines, trees and some homes.

Mid-November: Record cold settled on Vermont and much of the northeastern United States. Burlington dropped to a record 9 degrees on November 13, the coldest for so early in the season. Rutland dropped to 6 degrees. An early season snowstorm just before the cold wave also dumped six to ten inches of snow, with locally higher amounts in northern  Vermont. A second push of record cold air arrived on November 16-17.

December 30: A messy mix of snow, sleet and freezing rain fell across the state, most heavily in southern sections of Vermont.  Some trees and power lines came down.  Lightning and thunder were reported in Bennington and Windham counties.

So, How Did February And The Whole Winter Stack Up Here In Vermont

Heavy snow falls on St. Albans, Vermont on January 20, during
the biggest snowstorm of the winter.

Welcome to meterological spring, when climatologists, just for ease of record keeping, say spring starts. They deem it to begin today, March 1, so there you go.

Which give us the opportunity to look back and see how February stacked up in Vermont, and also, winter as a whole.

First, let's tackle February. Around Burlington, despite a lot of ups and downs, the mean temperature for the month came out close to average. It averaged out at 22.2, which is just 0.7 degrees above normal.

Elsewhere in Vermont, in places like Montpelier and St. Johnsbury, the month came out at about a degree cooler than normal. Which is essentially typical for February.

When it did get cold in February, 2019, it was never that cold. Burlington got to zero or below on five mornings, but the chilliest one was only minus 5, which is well within what we'd expect in the winter. The hottest day was February 5, which reached 53 degrees - good enough to be a record high for the date.

The month was on the wet side. Burlington had 2.34 inches of precipitation, which was a little more than a half inch soggier than average.

Freezing rain glazes trees in Burlington, Vermont on February 6. There
was a lot of mixed precipitation during the winter of 2018-19,
so there was a lot of ice underfoot. 

For the winter as a whole, taking in meteorological winter from December 1 to February 28, temperatures bounced all over the place but landed just about normal if you average it all out.

Burlingon was a whopping one tenth of one degree warmer than average for the winter. Essentially spot on normal.

It was a wet winter. Burlington had 8.46 inches of rain over the three months, which is 2.26 inches above normal. Although we had plenty of snow, there was a lot of rain, too. That kept snow cover modest, at least in the Champlain Valley.

There was briefly 18 inches of snow on the ground in mid-January, but only ten days out of the entire winter had at least 10 inches of snow covering the Queen City's lawns and parks.

Snow cover is much healthier in the Northeast Kingdom, and in mid and high elevations. As of yesterday, there was 39 inches of snow on the ground in Granby and 37 inches in Sutton, both up in the NEK. Averill had 34 inches of snow on the ground Corinth had 32 inches. The summit of Mount Mansfield was up above 100 inches.

Is U.S. Having A Cold Winter? Not Really, Despite "Polar Vortex" Hype

Moments like this - heavy snow falling amid subzero termperatures
in St. Albans, Vermont on January 20, might make us think
this winter has been particularly harsh. In the grand scheme
of things locally and nationwide, it hasn't been super bad

Remember all that hype about the "polar vortex" in January? That the United States was having a brutal winter?

In large part, it was hype. It's true that a few cities in the Midwest hit all-time record lows during that brief, sharp Arctic snap in late January.

But the first month of the year as a whole was the 29th warmest January on record or the United States. That's out of 125 years of record.

Which means we didn't exactly skip winter in January, but it was nothing historic, either.

Interestingly, in the rankings, right here in Vermont had the second coldest January, 2019 compared to rankings in all the other states during the month.  Vermont had its 57th chilliest January out of the past 125. That's still pretty close to normal, so it's no great shakes. Only Michigan, which had its 50th coldest January, was worse than Vermont.

No state in January was really uch colder than normal. Most of the west was warm, and California had its 10th warmest January on record.

Four cities in the United States did break or tie their all-time record low temperatures on January 31, writes Bob Henson in this Category 6 blog post. 

Henson cited weather records expert Maximiliano Herrera when he added this factoid to the blog post regarding the all-time record lows in the handful of U.S. cities on January 31:

"We've never gone so deep into January without an all-time cold record being set since global record-keeping began,' says Herrera. In contrast, in the Southern Hemisphere, where it is summer, January, 2019 saw two nations or territories and 47 stations set their all-time heat records."

Which means we shouldn't believe anyone who says global warming isn't happening because it was cold in Illinois in late January.

I think what made January seem harsh in the United States was that it was stormy. The United States as a whole had its 37th wettest January. Again, Vermont was a standout. The Green Mountain State and Rhode Island each had their eight wettest Januaries on record. No other state in the U.S. scored in the top 10 wettest.

Northern Maine was very snowy, Caribou had its snowiest January on record.

So far, February has been particularly chilly in most of the western half of the nation, so that will add an overall chill to the nation's winter as a whole. Places like Montana are particularly brutal. So far, temperatures in much of that state are running more than 25 degrees colder than normal, which is just beyond belief.

The West Coast is very chilly this month as well. Seattle is running 9 degrees colder than normal so far this month. Sacramento, California is nearly five degrees on the cold side.

However, any thought that this is a particularly brutal winter for the United States is hogwash.

Vermont Can't Catch A Break; Probably Will Miss Out On Warm Burst

This forecast map shows a strong storm over the middle of
the country, strong, cold high pressure just south of Hudson
Bay and a stalling front over the Northeast. That stalled
front seems destined to prevent Vermont from getting
a warm spell, and will produce a cold rain here and possibly
mixed precipitation and snow. 

I'm beginning to despair as to whether spring will ever get here. Case in point: The end of this week and the weekend.

A strong storm is very likely to get going in the middle of the country and push a strong warm front northward along the East Coast. In an area the warm front passes by, temperatures will soar into the 70s.

Here's the catch: The warm front seems destined to stall somewhere in New England. It's still possible the front will make it briefly to the Canadian border before slowly sinking south, but do't count on it.

Southern Vermont in particular might get into the warm air for a bit, but that's likely to be it.

The forecast here in Vermont for Friday through Sunday is still highly uncertain, since not one meteorologist is sure where the front will settle.

We do know the storm will have a rich supply of moisture, which for one means the threat of a severe storm and possible tornado outbreak Friday and Saturday in the South.

With that front expected to hang around here this weekend, it looks like we'll get a fair amount of precipitation here in the North Country.  The question is how much cold air will feed into the system from a frigid high pressure system up in Canada.

The bad news is most of Vermont is likely to get periods of cold rain Friday through next Monday. That's what the National Weather Service in South Burlington is going with, at least for now.

The even worse news is its possible northern Vermont, New Hampshire, Maine, New York and southern Quebec could get a bunch of mixed precipitation or even a substantial snowstorm.

Unfortunately, that's true. It's not definite, but a decent snowstorm is at least a slight possibility. This all will happen while places like New York, Washington and Philadelphia bask in sunshine and temperatures in the 70s to around 80.

Sigh.

It's also possible the front will set up far enough south for a while at least that northern Vermont gets just chilly, raw weather, with not much precipitation.

As you can see, ,this forecast is still extremely complicated and uncertain, so expect a LOT of fine tuning before the weekend and the weather actually hits. Stay tuned.

By the way, this same storm also seems destined to cause another pretty big snowstorm over the Northern Plains. So other people might suffer from a lack of spring as well.

Vermont's Snowy (And Slushy) Weather: An Update

Here's what the National Weather Service in South
Burlington is projecting for snowfall through early
Monday morning. (Click on the map to make it bigger
and easier to read.) Areas away from the Champlain
and Lower Connecticut River Valleys will
be the winners, with three to seven inches of new powder.

As of mid-morning this Sunday, snow was falling across much of Vermont and New York.

However, the flakes were pretty much avoiding the Champlain Valley. If you are in the Champlain Valley you also probably notice this morning it's windy from the south.

Winds are coming down the slopes of the Adirondacks and to a lesser extent the Green Mountains, and funneling into the Champlain Valley, causing the winds.

When the air first descends those mountain slopes, it dries, so we don't get the snow in the valley. Eventually, the incoming storm's moisture will increase, so it will start snowing the Champlain Valley this afternoon.

Those south winds are blowing in some warmer air, so especially near Lake Champlain. There, and in other low lying areas of Vermont, the snow will become wet and slushy, and even mix with or change to rain in some areas.

These two factors I outlined - the drying air in the Champlain Valley this morning and the warmish valley air this afternoon has a big impact on how much snow everyone will get, as you can imagine.

By the time this system ends late tonight, only one to three inches of snow will have accumulated in the lower Connecticut River Valley and the Champlain Valley. (with possibly a bit more in the far northern Champlain Valley. )

Places away from Lake Champlain and uphill from the Connecticut River Valley can expect a decent three to six inches of snow out of this by early Monday morning, giving the ski resorts a nice refresher layer o snow.

At this point, the National Weather Service is declaring the southern and central Adirondack Mountains of New York the big winner out of this otherwise modest storm. There, a winter storm warning is up for eight to 14 inches of snow. 

Everyone should get ready for a rather slow Monday morning commute, once again. It'll be a lot like Friday's rather cold, icy commute.

Here's why Monday morning will be difficult: The rather warm temperatures, wet snow and, in the warmer valleys, a mix with rain, will continue well into tonight. Late tonight, a sharp burst of colder air will rush in, turning all that slush to ice.

The wet snow will by then have been compacted into ice on the roads, and the incoming cold air will solidify that ice into really slick, thick stuff which will be hard to remove with snow plows and salt.

I am happy to report that, at least for the upcoming week, early projections of bone-chilling cold were overblown. There is incredibly cold air building up in Canada, especially near Hudson Bay and northern Quebec.

However, the core of the cold air will stay up there, and we'll be on the outer, southern edge of the deep chill. That means it will only be kind of, seasonably cold here in Vermont. Little pieces of this frigid air will occasionally break off and make us a little colder on occasion. It looks like the coldest days will be Monday and Friday. (Highs in the teens, lows near 0. Cold, but not ridiculous.) Most other days during the next week or so will feature highs in the 20s, not bad, really.

Depending on your perspective, being on the edge of a massive cold air blob in Canada, with warm, wet air well off to the southeast is good if like snow and ice, bad if you don't. This pattern puts Vermont right in a storm track. Which means we'll have active, and pretty unpredictable weather for awhile.

Another mid-sized, relatively fast moving storm will come by at midweek.  At this point, it looks like most of us will get a mid-sized snow out of this, with possible rain toward southeastern Vermont. A big caveat: If this thing takes a slight jog further north and west than is now predicted, more of us will get rain, and the snow would be confined more to the north and west.

If the current forecast does turn out to be correct,  this is all terrific for Vermont ski areas: Cold enough to make snow, and two decent natural snowfalls all coming right before the all important Presidents Week holiday.

Looking further ahead, it appears at this point at least, the massive cold blob in central Canada will stay there. But this is kind of an unstable weather pattern, which means we could end being surprised during the middle and second half of February with either an intense cold blast or two, or a real big thaw.

I always tell you to take weather forecasts beyond a few days with a big grain of salt. Right now, I'd say that grain of salt for forecasts beyond five days from now should be taken with a grain of salt at least as big as a Volkswagon, if not larger.

Most Insane Part Of Arctic Blast Is Today, Relief Coming, I Promise

Early this morning, I took the dogs outside to do their business at my St. Albans, Vermont house.

Flooding, ice chumks, debris, stuck cars and snow
remained Friday in coastal Massachusetts, still
recovering from the nor'easter and near record storm
surge and now, bitter cold. 

Needless to say, Jackson and Tonks did NOT stay out long, not with a roaring wind, blowing snow, subzero temperatures and a wind chill in the minus 30s.

I even had trouble closing the door when I got the dogs inside. Blowing snow was getting into the door jam and freezing. It's that bad.

Yes, here in Vermont and the rest of the Northeast, today is insane, no two ways about it. And we're tired of it. Aside from a rather poor excuse for a break in the cold this past Wednesday, we've endured this since December 26 - nearly two weeks.

The end of this Arctic siege is coming though. It will very likely be a temporary end, as it's still early winter, but we'll take it.

As we keep saying, you want to be super careful today in northern New England, much of the rest of the Northeast and southeastern Canada. Don't go outside if you don't have to, and if you do, cover up everything. Skin can easily freeze in less than a minute in these conditions.

Check on your elderly neighbors, too, They can get in trouble quickly in this weather. They can have problems with heat, or busted pipes or something else. Make sure they're warm and safe.

By the way, there's been a lot of nonsense online and in the media as to whether this cold snap and big nor'easter is a sign there's no global warming, or that climate change is entirely to blame. Look for a reality check on this ridiculous jabber in the next day or two.

Here in Vermont, temperatures will stay below zero all day. If Burlington, Vermont stays below zero all day today, which is highly likely, it'll be the first time that's happened since January 22, 2014. (It used to happen pretty much every year, but winters have generally gotten a little warmer.)

The wind will continue to crank all day, too. So there will be little, if any improvement from this morning's conditions.

The news for tonight is a mixed bag. On the plus side, the National Weather Service has backed away a bit from what they expect to be cold overnight lows. Instead of 20s to upper 30s below zero, depending on your location, we're now looking at something like 15 to 30 below. Vaguely better.

But that's because the wind will keep going for a good part of the night, keeping the atmosphere mixed and interfering with radiation of what little heat there is out to space. The wind will die down before dawn, and that's when temperatures will really plunge. Exactly how cold it gets where you are depends upon how early the wind dies down. The earlier the calm winds arrive, the colder it will get, generally speaking.

Temperatures will start to warm late Sunday morning and afternoon but you probably won't notice it. When a cold snap like this one ends in Vermont, I like to say it "warms up cold" especially in the Champlain Valley.

What happens is, the temperature indeed rises. But as the warmer air begins to flood in, strong southerly winds also arrive, most noticeably in the Champlain Valley.  That means wind chills become an issue again.

Sunday, then, won't be a nice day. There will also be a lot of blowing snow around. Remember, the wind Sunday will be coming from the opposite direction as it has for the past two days. That means snow that blew into protected areas will blow around again. Look for snowy, icy patches on roads, drifts and areas of poor visiblity.

It's going to snow again, too, on Sunday night and Monday. Not much. We're looking at one to three inches most places.

By Monday afternoon, however, the warm air will have flooded in. Look for temperatures somewhere in the 25 to 35 degree range Monday. That's above zero, my friends.

If the temperature rises above freezing in Burlington Monday, that would mean we spent 15 consecutive days below freezing. That's not an amazing record, though. That would tie us for the 63rd longest continuous stretch below freezing. The record is 52 days, during the tough winter of 1976-77.

Another cold front will come through Tuesday, but don't worry, this next cold front is really lame. You really won't even notice it. High temperatures Tuesday will be near 32 degrees and "cool" into the 20s Wednesday. Not bad.

Toward the end of the week - Thursday and Friday - we could genuinely get into some thaw conditions in Vermont, with temperatures possibly in the 30s to low 40s during the day. The only problem is mixed precipitation or even rain is a good bet on those days.

Even if there's plain rain, it's been so cold lately that the ground temperatures are frigid. Say it's 38 degrees and raining Thursday afternoon. We'd still be getting freezing rain because the precipitation would likely freeze on contact with pavement. But at least it will be warmer!

This pattern change is good news, though, for most of the country. The eastern half of the nation has been in a deep freeze for so long now. This new weather pattern will keep almost the entire nation warm.

It also has been scarily dry in California this winter. Wildfires lasted into the end of December, which is unprecedented. This new weather pattern makes rainstorms and mountain snowstorms a very good bet for all of California in the upcoming week or two. They only drawback to the California rains is that, starting Monday, locally heavy rains will cause potentially dangerous debris flows in the vast areas hit by wildfires between August and December.

This warmer, and for California, wetter pattern looks like it will last at least into the third week of January. (We'll get brief cold spells here in Vermont, but nothing extreme.) Who knows, though, what we'll deal with in late January and February? At least we're getting a break, though.

Less Snow, More Rain During The Winter In Most Of The Nation

In early February, there's usually a lot of snow
on the ground at my northwestern Vermont home.
But as you can see here, I was building
a small stone wall and putting in good soil
for a perennial garden on February 4.
It rained a little that day, too, bolstering
the notion that more winter storms are
bringing rain, not snow.

Hot on the heels of one of the most intense (but brief) New England February cold snaps in recent memory, a storm is coming.

Yeehah! That means powder day at the ski resorts, right?  It's cold, so that means snow, doesn't it?

Um, no.

Oh sure, this storm will bring some snow. As noted elsewhere on this blog, precipitation with with the storm will start as snow tonight night and Tuesday.

However, on Tuesday, in much of the Northeast, all the way up in the Adirodacks in in Vermont, New Hampshire and Maine, the snow will change to sleet, freezing rain, and then rain on Tuesday.

This storm is bringing quite a surge of warm air with it.

It's been that way this winter. And to be real, more rain and less snow has been a trend in most of the nation in recent years and decades.

Oh sure, there's still blockbuster snowstorms, like the Mid-Atlantic blizzard in late January and the immense snow siege in eastern New England and southeastern Canada last winter.

But the trend is for more rain, and less snow in general.

Climate Central crunched the data on winter precipitation by looking at 2,121 weather stations where snow is a pretty routine occurence in the winter.

At these weather stations, they looked at the number of days with precipitation in the months where they typically get snowstorms totalling one inch or greater. That includes mid-winter, and in places where it happens, snowfalls in the late autumn and early spring - the so-called shoulder seasons.

Overall, the Climate Central analysis found that 55 percent of these weather stations showed a decrease in winter precipitation falling as snow.

The greatest drop offs were in those shoulder seasons of late autumm and early spring. That makes sense. Temperatures are normally more marginal for snow then than in the depths of winter, so on balance it takes less of a temperature change in the fall and spring to switch snow over to rain.

It doesn't strike me as any one particular region of the country saw the steepest dropoff in snowy days in favor of rain.

The states with the greatest percentages of their weather stations seeing more snowy season rains are, in order, Oregon, Iowa, New Hampshire, Washington and Kansas, says Climate Central.

The implications of this, of course, are that ski resorts and winter sports enthusiasts suffer because of this.

So do tourist-dependent governments.

Here where I live in Vermont, the warm, relatively snow-free winter we've been having are starting to create budget problems for the state.

"This isn't looking good for us," said Vermont Gov. Peter Shumlin last week, reports NECN. "The mountains are struggling. Our receipts - our tax receipts - are seeing a direct hit from the fact that we're not bringing 4 million skiers in this year. We're bringing in a lesser amount. That could change, but it's got to change mighty fast."

Luckily, last winter in Vermont was kind of snowy and the ski season went well then. But the Vermont legislature is already dealing with a tight budget, and the drop in rooms and meals taxes, amd sales taxes this winter is going to hurt.

Plus, if this trend of less and less snowy winters continues, Vermont and other winter tourism-dependent states will really need to find a new revenue source and/or cut spending further.

In the West, many areas depend upon the slow trickle of snow melt during the spring and summer from the mountains for their water needs. But if more precipitation falls as rain, all that water will run off the mountains in the winter, rather than summer.

Some reservoirs can catch that winter rain instead of waiting for the summer snow melt. But other reservoirs don't have that capacity. That means a water storage headache for much of that region.

Less snow means the ground turns bare in the western mountains earlier in the spring. Which means the land dries earlier and more completely in the spring and summer, leading to an increased risk of wild fires.

That was part of the problem last summer. There wasn't much snow in the western mountains, it melted early, setting the stage for a long, destructive season of wildfires.

Some people hate snow, but even if you hate it, consider it a necessary evil. And things could become more evil if the trend line for less and less snow continues.

Another Monster Nor'Easter As Warm Oceans Fuel Storms Big Time

Big nor'easter off the coast this morning.
It's yet another in a parade of very intense
storms this winter.

Boy, that nor'easter lurking off the Carolina coast this morning looks like a monster. And it totally is.

It's a classic "bomb" meaning it intensified super fast, and it's now an enormous, intense storm packing hurricane force winds and flinging around lots of precipitation and lightning. 

A normal nor'easter in this position this one is this morning would be too far offshore to have an enormous impact on the coast. Maybe some wind, light snow, nasty ocean waves.

But this one is so huge, so intense, that is is having a big effect. Blizzard warnings are still up for much of Cape Cod and the Islands. Up to 18 inches of snow propelled by gusts over 60 mph are still expected there today.

Elsewhere in southeastern New England, a good six to 12 inches of snow will fall.  Blizzard alerts are up in parts of the Maritime Provinces in Canada, too.

Coastal flood alerts are up from South Carolina to New England.

This storm is yet another "over performer" and we've seen a number of them this year. By over performer, I mean the storms have been stronger and more intense than many initial forecasts, and they've been nastier than what you'd normally expect.

Think about it. That late January blizzard really clobbered the Mid-Atlantic states with up to 42 inches of snow and coastal storm surges that broke records in Delaware and southern New Jersey.

Just last Friday, a nor'easter intensified a lot more than some forecasters anticipated. Up to a foot of heavy, wet snow collapsed many trees and power lines.

Over in Great Britain, a series of winter storms since early December have brought catastrophic floods, very damaging winds and coastal surges. Another intense storm is hitting England today.

Is this series of storms just coincidences? I doubt it.

A lot of what's fueling these storms is unusually warm ocean waters, especially off the U.S. East Coast. (There is a cold patch up in the North Atlantic, but it's unclear how that's affecting storms.)

The warm water is conducive to extra evaporation, which means more moisture available to a storm. The contrast between the usual Arctic air masses that descend down from Canada into that warm ocean water increases, making nor'easters stronger as well,  says the Washington Post. 

All this tends to make storms more intense, both in terms of the amount of precipitation they drop, and in terms of how strong they get, and how windy they get.

The warm ocean water off the East Coast this winter is due in large part - but not solely - due to climate change scientists are saying, as noted in the Washington Post article.


There's already been an observed increase in the intensity of winter storms along and off the East Coast.

Says the Washingotn Post:

"Overall, notes the U.S. National Climate Assessment, the northern hemisphere has seen a trend toward more frequent and intense winter storms since 1950. So hs the United States.

According to a 2013 consensus report published in the Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society,  'the number of severe regional snowstorms that occurred since 1960 was more than twice the number that occurred during the preceding 60 years' in the United States."



I think as long as water temperatures in the western Atlantic stay warmer than normal this winter and early spring, the risk will remain for more strong storms.


Since ocean temperatures are generally on the long term increase due to global warming, I think we might need to get used to more intense nor'easters in the United States and Canada, and bigger blows in the UK and Europe as well.