Even with near record breaking warmth Thursday, legitimate storm/snowfall potential has emerged for early next week

As far as non-powdery weather goes, it's hard to beat what happened on Sunday when a full dose of late March sunshine boosted temperatures to 60 degrees in valley areas and 50's across the high country.  At the risk of telling folks what is already well known, we can go long stretches during the spring without weather like this and we've gotten a bunch of it this March including Monday (today) Tuesday and most of Wednesday. Winter it seems, has made a decisive retreat with much of this week looking very warm and the first several days of April also looking very warm. The one exception to the warm outlook would be the last three days of March; when, a surge of colder temperatures now has some accompanying big storm potential. More on that in a bit. 

Ahead of any cold weather during the early part of next week comes comes even milder weather at the end of this week. The sunshine and warm afternoons have been magnificent but could also be described as garden variety early spring warmth. Balmier, tropical-like temperatures will build across the southeast early this week and make a very impressive push northward late this week. A warm front marking the advance of this more intense version of warmth will bring clouds to the region late Wednesday and a few hours of much needed rain Wednesday evening.   If the clouds break on Thursday as models now suggest then El Torchy will envelop all of Vermont in record-breaking style with temperatures soaring to near 70 degrees in low lying areas (away from the chilled Lake Champlain),  and well into the 60's even at 2000 feet. El Torchy will also keep temperatures mostly in the 50's Thursday night into early Friday  when at that time a significant weather system from our southwest brings clouds and rainfall to all of northern New England. 

Colder Canadian air will be trying to work its way southward during the weather event on Friday leaving temperatures a bit uncertain during the day. Those colder temperatures, which will arrive early Saturday a the latest are only likely to bring temperatures back to sub-freezing levels above 2500 feet or so with readings hovering closer at 2000 feet or less. Readings will fall back to sub-freezing levels Saturday night as the pattern puts the pieces in place for one more big March amplification late on Sunday and into Monday. 

The situation early next week does not include any widespread surge of arctic cold but rather two benign looking weather disturbances that appear poised for a major league phase along the northeast coast on Monday, March 29th. I was skeptical when seeing hints of this over the weekend but the idea of a big storm now has support from all three major ensemble packages with uncertainly relating more to the track/positioning of the phased and rapidly intensifying storm early Monday. So yes, the situation early next week could all fall apart as many of the big storm setups have for northern Vermont this year but I will venture to say that it will be the track of the storm that would fail us rather than the presence of said storm. If a phased storm bombs either right on top of us or too far to our south (as a few have this year) we would certainly end up on the short end of the snowfall measuring stick. I will also point out that El Torchy will put a massive dent in our snowpack Thursday and will leave conditions pretty thin in many places this weekend. North-facing and shady locations can survive sunshine, calm winds and low dewpoints even when temperatures are warm but the airmass this Thursday will have higher dewpoints and some stronger snow-eating winds.  

More warmth is also showing up in the outlook for early April, powered by the suddenly continued presence of a positive AO. The +AO can have an early April bash as far as I am concerned so long as it retreats by next winter.