647
FXUS61 KBTV 211906
AFDBTV
Area Forecast Discussion
National Weather Service Burlington VT
206 PM EST Sat Feb 21 2026
.WHAT HAS CHANGED...
As of 203 PM EST Saturday...
Snowfall amounts continue to increase for southern and central
Vermont for Sunday night into Monday.
&&
.KEY MESSAGES...
As of 203 PM EST Saturday...
1. Snow showers continue to taper off this afternoon but linger
over northern New York.
2. Continued northwestward trend in the nor`easter sunday night
into Monday.
3. Cold midweek, then another round of widespread precipitation
is possible over the latter half of the week.
&&
.DISCUSSION...
As of 203 PM EST Saturday...
KEY MESSAGE 1: A backdoor cold front is slowly progressing down from
the northeast. There is much drier air behind it with the snow
stopping and the sun coming out. It should push through northern
Vermont by this evening and the rest of Vermont and parts of Clinton
County by tomorrow morning. While the sunshine will likely be
reserved to the Northeast Kingdom and adjacent areas, the snow
showers should end in the rest of the places after its passage. A
few snow showers will linger across parts of northern New York
through much of tomorrow.
KEY MESSAGE 2: A powerful nor`easter develops off the Mid-Atlantic Coast
on Sunday and its center tracks southeast of Cape Cod and the
islands Sunday night into Monday. It is increasingly looking like an
ideal storm track for southern New England, while Vermont and
northern New York will be on the northern fringe. As typical for
these events, there looks to be sharp gradient on the northern edge.
Probabilities of 4 or more inches for Rutland and Windsor counties
remain around 25-40 percent, but there is some old guidance going
into those so they will likely rise a bit due to the westward shift.
There is also the potential for a mesoband to reach southern Vermont
and locally increase snowfall amounts there. Northern areas are only
likely to see an inch or two at most, barring an unexpected major
change in the storm track. The surface pressure of the low is
expected to drop below 980 mb and potentially below 970 mb as it
passes by, creating a significant pressure gradient. A strong
easterly low level jet looks to develop across southern Vermont,
with 40-60 KTs looking increasing likely at 4,000 feet. This is
thankfully higher and weaker than in many high wind events, but
gusts in the 30-40 mph range look increasingly likely in southern
Vermont. Downsloping will likely reduce snow amounts in the areas
around Rutland and south along the Route 7 corridor. Channeled
northerly flow also looks likely in the Champlain Valley later
Monday, with gusts in the 25 to 35 mph range possible. Overall,
there has been an impressive westward shift in guidance relatively
close to the event. Back on Thursday, it was just the GFS and a
couple GEFS/CAN ensembles bringing any notable snow to southern New
England, and now they are expecting blizzard conditions and several
inches are increasingly likely across southern Vermont.
KEY MESSAGE 3: Cold air advection behind a departing coastal
storm will push us about 10-15 degrees below normal in the mid
teens and 20s Tuesday afternoon. Portions of northern New York
could see wind chills Tuesday morning and early afternoon
approaching 15 below. Tuesday night into Wednesday morning will
feature min temperatures in the -5 to 5 F range. Our next
chance for precipitation will be on Wednesday when a shortwave
slides through the region and a surface low pressure moving
across the Great Lakes and New York/Vermont international
border. With low pressure to our west, we anticipate some warm
air advection across northern New York and Vermont on Wednesday.
Wednesday night, the surface low looks to ride along the
international border before speeding north and east early
Thursday morning. The Canadian model and ECMWF both seem to try
and keep this system separated into two upper shortwaves. A
greater gap between the two means snow for the onset Wednesday
into Wednesday night, but southwest return flow is allowed to
take place and warm us above freezing with a wintry mix or rain,
particularly Wednesday night into Thursday night and mainly in
the valleys. For the ECMWF and Canadian, having not combined the
waves for the Wednesday system, that secondary wave rides
through quickly behind on Thursday, though placement and speed
of cold frontal boundaries still create discrepancies between
the two models. The GFS, however, combines the two waves into
one and includes some upslope precipitation behind it on
Thursday. Where the systems are more closely entwined like in
the GFS solution, there`s less warm advection that takes place
and more snow. The GFS brings another wave through Thursday
night and Friday. This differs from the other two models, which
keep us mostly dry by Friday. With both scenarios, precipitation
is likely, but the nature of how and when this plays out
between Wednesday afternoon and Friday is uncertain.
&&
.AVIATION /19Z SATURDAY THROUGH THURSDAY/...
Through 18Z Sunday...Snow showers will continue through part of
the afternoon before gradually tapering off. Intervals of 4+
mile visibilities and ceilings anywhere from 400-5000 feet above
ground level are expected over the next couple of hours. If you
take a look at visible satellite, you can spot where the line
between clouds and clear skies is sinking southwestward across
the Northeast Kingdom this afternoon. Most model solutions are
showing clear skies in the Northeast Kingdom/site KEFK by 00Z
Sunday, while sites like KSLK and KRUT remain BKN-OVC for the
next 24 hours. The rest of our sites (KMSS, KPBG, KBTV, and
KMPV) will be somewhere in between. We do anticipate KSLK
ceilings to rise over the next few hours to around 2000-3000
feet, though KRUT looks to remain socked in with BKN 400-700
feet cigs until around 03Z Sunday. Exactly when ceilings rise to
1000+ feet at KRUT remains highly dependent on when exactly the
site switches over from the light northerly or variable winds
to stronger southeasterly winds and low clouds will be able to
scour out. For our "in between" sites, we could see cloud levels
sit around 2500- 3500 feet for a portion of the afternoon and
evening, fluctuating between SCT and BKN. Looking like best shot
to have widespread VFR is around 00Z-09Z, though some sites may
see it sooner than that, over the next few hours (KMSS in
particular). As conditions clear in many spots, we could then
see temperatures drop quickly tonight, resulting in quick
surface level saturation that may result in some mist. KEFK
looks like a particularly good candidate for this with current
dew point in the teens and our projected lows tonight in the
single digits. However, there remains some disagreement amongst
high resolution models on the extent of cloud cover aloft as
well as the speed at which lower clouds move back northwards to
cover the Northeast Kingdom. KEFK also looks to hold onto some
level of northerly, then southeasterly, wind 3-5 knots and is
solidly in a drier air mass. Other sites may have better chances
of seeing lighter or calm winds tonight after the northerly
flow decreases and moisture remains, so they may also have on
and off mist generally 4- 6 miles. Saturday, cloud cover shifts
back north and cloud ceilings lower again in many locations as a
low pressure rotates over the Great Lakes, sending a couple
snow showers towards northern New York.
Outlook...
Sunday Night: Mainly VFR, with local MVFR possible. Slight chance
SN.
Monday: VFR. Chance SN.
Monday Night: Mainly VFR, with local MVFR possible. Slight chance
SN.
Tuesday: Mainly VFR, with local MVFR possible. NO SIG WX.
Tuesday Night: VFR. NO SIG WX.
Wednesday: Mainly MVFR, with areas VFR possible. Chance SN.
Wednesday Night: Mainly MVFR, with local IFR possible. Chance SN.
Thursday: Mainly MVFR, with local IFR possible. Chance RA, Chance
SN.
&&
.EQUIPMENT...
The KMPV ASOS has suffered a communications failure. The issue
has been diagnosed, but there is currently no estimated time of
return to service. Terminal Aerodrome Forecasts will continue,
but amendments to those forecasts will be suspended.
NOAA Weather Radio station WXM-44, transmitting from Mt.
Ascutney, Vermont, on frequency 162.475 MHz is non- operational
at this time. NWS technicians have diagnosed the problem, but
repairs will likely not be able to occur for quite some time due
to circumstances beyond our control. Therefore, the time of
return to service is currently unknown. The following NOAA
Weather Radio transmitters may be able to provide service during
this outage: WWG 50 from Burke Mtn, VT at 162.425 MHz and WNG
546 from Hanover, NH at 162.525 MHz.
The Colchester Reef meteorological station is out of service.
This site is not serviced by the NWS and there isn`t an
estimated return to service at present. Please contact us if you
observe winds significantly deviating from the recreational
forecast.
&&
.BTV WATCHES/WARNINGS/ADVISORIES...
VT...None.
NY...None.
&&
$$
WHAT HAS CHANGED...Myskowski
DISCUSSION...Myskowski/Storm
AVIATION...Storm
EQUIPMENT...NWS BTV
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