2021 starts with a possible friendly 1-2 punch with 6-plus inches likely early Saturday and more possible late Sunday/Monday

In spite of the near 5 degree temperatures Wednesday morning in the MRV, the pattern going forward looks very non-arctic. Jet stream blocking over the Labrador Sea/Davis Strait will become the dominant weather feature on the northern hemisphere chess board and will clear all of eastern Canada of arctic air and likely keep it that way for a few weeks. Temperatures across northern New England are thus going to remain above average until mid-January but this doesn't mean we are SOL. In early December or perhaps in March/April, a pattern this void of arctic cold would likely not deliver much, but we are entering the coldest climatological period of the winter. A pattern consisting of a robust polar jet this time of the year often will suppress storms and snow and leave interior New England cold and dry. Such will not be the case over the next few weeks ! We have to get the storm track to cooperate but we are owed some cooperation in this -AO/NAO setup and we may finally be moving into a time frame when that starts to happen.

The outlook for New Years weekend has continued to improve as you've probably heard. Even New Years Eve, though certainly a lot milder than average, will only see temperatures slightly above freezing in the morning accompanied by mixed precipitation or some wet snow followed by some clearing. 2020 will end mercifully with a nice view of starry skies, some hope in the air and temperatures down around 20 degrees. The juicy weather system for the weekend comes out of Texas on New Years Day and will advance quickly northeast toward the eastern Great Lakes. Early sunshine will give way to clouds in Vermont but the ski day will remain precipitation free and rather calm with readings in the high 20's. The storm in question continues to look farther south and is likely to track over southern Vermont and NOT the St Lawrence Valley. This puts northern Vermont in a much better place for snowfall and minimizes the time we might experience any sleet while reducing the risk for freezing rain or rain.  I would expect the snow to begin around midnight Saturday and continue through much of the morning.  Amazingly, this could be the best snow of the year for northern Vermont ski country with accumulations of over 6 inches by early afternoon. Yes sleet could compress accumulations but even that looks to be less significant according to the latest round of data. Southern Vermont may also see some snow but less than 6 inches and is also still likely to see freezing rain or drizzle during the day Saturday. It won't be especially cold in the MRV Saturday but cold enough with temperatures holding in the high 20's. 

Saturday's snow is not the last of this subtropical, southern branch jet energy which continues to make life very difficult on medium range models.  A trailing wave of low pressure is now expected to form over TN/KY Saturday as the snow is tapering off in the MRV. Ultimately this weather feature will move to the Virginia Tidewater before turning northeastward and strengthening. There is the bare minimum amount of available cold air for this storm and it still might track a bit too far south but it also might not. Snowfall is thus at least possible beginning very late in the ski day Sunday and persisting through Sunday night into Monday. Were it to happen, temperatures would likely hover just below the freezing mark on the mountain making this a wetter snowfall but those details are not worth the effort in sorting just yet. 

Following any potential snowfall on Monday, the first full week of 2021 appears mild but not excessively so. Temperatures are likely to mostly remain below freezing across the high country even as low lying areas experience 1-2 near 40-degree days. Sounds a lot like something you might expect skiing in Colorado and this is likely what we will see through the middle of the month. As far as snowfall for the rest of next week, a moisture starved disturbance will bring the chance for very light snow to northern Vermont Tuesday and then another system may or may not impact the state sometime during the end of the week. The period between January 6-10 looks a little fuzzy with more time needed to sort out details. In a general sense though, it does appear as if the milder temperatures (in a relative sense) could peak during the weekend of the 9th/10th and the week of January 11-15 again appears stormy. It could very well get fun again but we our storms to tunnel underneath the blocking as they will do this weekend. We can do this Vermont, lets make it happen in 2021 !