HURRICANE IRENE 10TH ANNIVERSARY… HURRICANE IDA TO CAUSE WIDESPREAD DAMAGE TO SOUTHERN LOUISIANA ON THE 16TH ANNIVERSARY OF HURRICANE KATRINA… MUCH MORE TRANQUIL IN WMASS, THOUGH IDA’S REMNANTS MAY BRING FLOODING HEAVY RAINS ON WEDNESDAY INTO THURSDAY MORNING… OTHERWISE, WE’RE TRYING TO TRANSITION INTO AN AUTUMNAL PATTERN… STRONG TO SEVERE T-STORMS TOMORROW, AS WE WORK THROUGH THIS TRANSITION THIS WEEK… 7:35am Sunday…

Good morning everybody, to start, I’d be remiss if I didn’t mention that it’s been a decade since Hurricane / Tropical Storm Irene bore down on the northeast U.S., resulting in catastrophic flooding in the state of Vermont down into western Franklin County and Shelburne Falls 10 years ago today.

IRENE AND IDA
Irene was the first big storm I covered on my then-nascent weather page, only a few weeks old at the time. Here my story and some info about Irene on my website if you want to check it out:

And if there are any stories you want to share, I would appreciate reading them, just place into the comments below.

Meanwhile Hurricane Ida has developed into a monster Cat 4 hurricane with sustained winds to 150mph around its center and higher gusts, and could even strengthen into a Cat 5 just before landfall, which would be a worst case scenario, and help to maximize storm surge into those low-lying southern Louisiana areas, now forecast to be 12-16 feet, maybe a bit higher. Katrina’s surge was 20 feet, by comparison.

Ida relates to southern New England and the WMass region in that the attached chart shows that we could be dealing with an extratropical (non warm-core) low remnant of Ida by Thursday morning capable of dumping 3-5″+ over our region, causing flash flooding concerns if that comes to pass.

TODAY THROUGH WEDNESDAY
Backing up, in the WMass region, we have clouds and a few showers that are working through the region today, as a warm front lifts northeast and through our area.

This will increase humidity by afternoon, and especially overnight and tomorrow. Highs today will be in the upper 60s to upper 70s, unless we can get some sunshine to break out across the region later today, which could nudge temps up a few degrees. A spot shower is possible.

Tonight, lows will drop into the mid to upper 60s with a light south wind and humidity will be increasing.

For Monday, we’ll have a cold front slicing southeast through the St. Lawrence River Valley in southeast Canada, which is marking the southeastward boundary of cooler, drier Canadian air.

This will push into the warmer and more humid air over southern New England, where highs will reach the low to mid 80s on Monday under mostly cloudy skies. Any sunny breaks could help destabilize the surface further, and all of these factors will help to generate a likely broken line of thunderstorm clusters moving through during the afternoon. Some storms may become strong to severe, especially east of the I-91 corridor, and damaging localized wind gusts would be the main threat.

Any showers or storms dissipate at night, with lows dropping into the low 60s behind the front.

Tuesday looks more refreshing with a light west wind, highs in the upper 70s to low 80s, and drier conditions – a tranquil day. Lows again will drop into the low 60s.

IDA’S RAINY REMNANTS
On Wednesday, we will be clouding up again, and we’ll have to watch to say where the remnants of Hurricane Ida tracks. It could be shunted mostly south of us, but signals continue to indicate that we could be dealing with a serious slug of rainfall Wednesday afternoon into Thursday morning as Ida by that time will be a cold-core, extratropical storm system pushing off of the Mid-Atlantic coastline, staying to our south.

Several inches of rainfall could result, and flash flood or flood watches would likely be hoisted by the NWS by late Monday or early Tuesday, and I will keep you updated.

Any rain clears out of here by Thursday afternoon the way it looks now, and the departure of Ida pulls in more dry, cool Canadian air to end the upcoming work week as a taste of Autumn visits our shores, with highs in the low 70s and lows in the low 50s.

Keep the folks in Louisiana in your thoughts, and I hope your day goes well for you.