New England's dry fall has continued to roll right into November. Both September and October saw much of New England receiving 50% or less of typical rainfall with plenty of areas seeing far less than that. Hartford, Bridgeport, Worcester and Caribou all saw a top six driest September on record. These conditions escalated in October. Providence, Boston, Hartford, Worcester and Bridgeport all saw 25% or less of typical rainfall. With less than a month to go in meteorological fall, Boston currently sits at 2.25" of rain, making this the 2nd driest fall on record.
New England has been more on the edge of this prolonged stretch of dry fall weather. The Mid-Atlantic, particularly New Jersey, has been the epicenter. October 2024 was not only the driest October on record for the state, but the driest month ever recorded (which includes over 1,500 months total in the record books). Several Climate sites saw 0% of typical precipitation in the Mid-Atlantic and New York as less than a tenth of an inch fell.
Meanwhile, northern New England saw much less of a deficit than southern New England in October. Portland, Concord, Caribou and Concord all saw about 30 to 60% of typical precipitation; still a deficit, but not to the levels of southern New England's 4% (Bridgeport) to 23% (Providence).
Storm systems have been deflected well to the north of New England through Canada throughout the fall. You have to go all the way to Newfoundland in Canada to find closer to average precipitation, with the province seeing 85-150% of typical precipitation, with the northern coast seeing the most.
These prolonged dry conditions have led to a rather rapid expansion of drought conditions across New England. After two months of this very dry weather, over 30% of Massachusetts is currently in a severe drought. All of southern New England outside of Cape Cod and the Islands are facing a moderate drought. This moderate drought extends into southern Vermont, southern New Hampshire and much of Maine. This is quite an expansion from three months ago, when only southeast New Hampshire was seeing drought conditions.
Below: Current US drought monitor (1st image) and the monitor from three months ago (2nd image):
Over the past few weeks, this dry weather has led to a very active fall fire season in New England. A red flag warning is in effect for southern New England for Saturday, November 9th. This is the eighth red flag warning issued this fall in New England. October saw just over 200 brush fires erupt in Massachusetts alone with over 100 igniting in the last week of the month. The average number of brush fires in October is 15. Over 100 also cropped up in Connecticut this fall. Dozens of others have been seen across all six New England states.
Wildfires have continued to pop up across the region into November, with the latest including a five acres fire that shut down the Mass Pike on Thursday afternoon in Chicopee, MA, one that burned dangerously close to an apartment complex in Saugus, MA and one that damaged the side of a home in Monson, MA.
Just yesterday evening, a large brush fire broke out in Lynn, MA. As of midnight, the Lynn fire department had reported that the fire had grown to over 100 acres in size. A brush fire in North Andover, MA overnight forced the evacuation of three homes. One home was damaged by the flames.
Fires in Lynn (1st image; NECN) and Chicopee (2nd image; WWLP)
In Connecticut, a brush fire caused heavy damage to a farm in Orange this past week. In Norwich, Connecticut, a brush fire was reported early Saturday morning. The fire spread to a nearby apartment building, which forced the evacuation of the building. Fortunately, the fire only damaged the outside of the building before being contained. No one was injured and no one has been displaced.
Many fires have been smaller and quickly contained, however, several larger ones have erupted. These larger ones include Berlin, CT; Middleton, MA; Lynn, MA and Salem, MA. Fires in these communities have reached over 100 acres each. The largest being the Middleton fire, which burned over 250 acres. In New Jersey, a wildfire has burned over 360 acres and forced evacuations as over 100 structures were threatened. As of yesterday evening, the fire has been 90% contained and evacuation orders have been lifted.
What the region really needs is a widespread, soaking rainfall. In the short term, a frontal system will quickly shuffle through the region Sunday night into Monday morning. Unfortunately, this won't be a soaking rain as only a period of light showers is expected as the best forcing will once again be shoved north of New England.
Looking ahead, another system will move through New England, bringing another round of showers to the region around Thursday or Friday of next week. This currently does not look like a soaking, much like the Sunday night to Monday system, but much uncertainty still exists in regards to precipitation amounts. Recent trends have been toward a weaker system. After this system, guidance is split on whether general troughing or ridging will be in place for New England, though troughing is generally favored.
Overall, ridging is expected to generally continue with any potential troughing expected to break down rather quickly. This persistent ridging over the east coast will continue to make it difficult for deep troughing to develop over New England. This will also keep the coldest, winter-like air confined well north, near the Arctic Circle. A zonal flow is expected to develop over New England, which will generally keep storm systems less impactful, and unfortunately, pack less rainfall for New England.
Below: Current Weather Prediction Center 7-day precipitation outlook, showing 0.5-1" of precipitation for New England. This will come between the Sunday night and late week systems, so neither is currently favored to bring a soaking slug of rainfall. This could very easily trend downward based on what happens with the late week system:
New England's weather pattern so far this fall has been one of persistence. The pattern has generally been toward prolonged periods of ridging and high pressure followed by much more brief periods of troughing and low pressure passing to the north of the region. This has really limited the amount of rain chances for New England.
The season has been dominated by expansive and strong areas of high pressure over the northeast. This has led to dry air setting up over New England and most storm systems getting deflected away. With ridging over the northeast, northern stream systems have been forced well to the north of New England, keeping their precipitation to the north as well.
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