Weather pattern aligning for some good times in March, but the party starts early with a snowy last Sunday of February

For much of the last two months, the prevailing weather pattern has presented Vermont with so many roadblocks that even the rare snowy stretches seemed like an obstacle course to the finish line. With the arrival of March and as always, with impeccable New England weather irony, the roadblocks fade away and the horizon is dotted with more chances for snow than I can even keep track of. Over the next week to 10 days, the pattern is anchored by a negative NAO working overtime to mitigate the pesky ridge across southeast North America, but eventually the jet stream in the Pacific fizzles sending, the EPO index plunging into negative territory and favoring both cold weather in the eastern part of our continent and snowfall over New England. Even the National Weather Service, typically rather conservative regarding predictions of cold or anomalous weather in the long range is throwing out a map encompassed by a sea of blue in the middle or March over the entire United States minus Florida. This an incredibly bold prediction (several weeks out) in a time frame that usually falls outside the of a window where a weather forecast can provide much value, but the folks at NOAA who put this together obviously feel confident about where the MJO is headed and how various ensembles are handling some of these Pacific feedbacks going forward. With all that said, let this March party begin ! 

 

And the additional snowfall starts Sunday from what appears to be a small disturbance, but one capable of really enhancing low level instability over the northern Vermont high country. Snow should begin falling shortly after first chair, and is expected to continue for much of the day and into the evening on the mountain even as snow flurries mix with some intermittent sunshine over valley locations. Based on the instability parameters, one could make a case for a big positive surprise over the high country with some occasionally heavy snow squalls leading to 6 or more inches. I would favor that kind of outcome a bit farther north, but Sunday on the mountain should consist of a fluffy kind of snow, likely to exceed 3 inches. Hopefully we get surprised, conditions are there for it ! 

The Tuesday February 28th storm has trended the other way unfortunately. Doesn't appear as if we get shut out, but also certainly doesn't appear that this will turn into the storm of the season. Instead, the initial big low pressure area set to move over the Great Lakes will mature, weaken and transition much of its energy to a coastal low that will get squeezed eastward and will never get the opportunity to evolve into a full-blown nor'easter. Snowfall should envelop Vermont Tuesday and persist through much of the day, but should never become especially heavy and accumulations are more likely to be in the 3-6 inch category. Not a bad addition to our recent stretch of snow, but not a headline. 

The arrival of March will fittingly bring some above-freezing temperatures, aided perhaps by a rare appearance of morning sunshine in this very active weather pattern. More storminess and more cloudiness should quickly envelop the region however and by the end of the first day of March, we can expect more precipitation, most likely falling as snow across the mountains producing a few more inches for the Thursday ski day. 

Thursday March 2nd into early Friday March 3rd appear to be weather-free though clouds are likely to persist over northern New England. The next storm approaching from the southwest later Friday appears especially potent with a massive swath of heavy precipitation. This storm very possibly could achieve what Tuesday failed to do, but the track of this system remains very uncertain with some models confining the impact of this system to the southeast U.S. while other models are prepared to deliver northern New England a 1-2 footer for the weekend. 

In the last update, I had indicated a possible more spring-like warm period for the first full weekend in March. No doubt, model data has moved in a cooler direction especially next Saturday and Sunday, but there are still indications that the southeast ridge takes one last breath before succumbing to the aforementioned changes in the Pacific. It really isn't especially hard to string together a few 40-plus afternoons in March and this still appears possible early in the first full week of March (5th and 6th). After that, the weather pattern favors much of what the National Weather Service is advertising in that bold map they issued. Cold weather of a broad scope and something we really haven't seen since prior to Christmas.  The weakened Pacific will send a few southern streamers our way, bringing us the additional chances for snow as we approach the middle of March.