Thursday 19 February 2015

Same Old, Same Old...

     Another day, another extreme cold warning... At least it didn't get as cold as some forecasts were indicating for this morning. Temperatures ''only'' dipped to -30.3°C at the airport.

     A slight warmup for tonight and tomorrow as a weak clipper system moves through. This will bring some light snow tonight, and at times tomorrow. I'm only expecting about 1 or 2 cm of accumulation. Relatively warm with a high close to -10°C tomorrow. There may be a bit of wind behind the system in the afternoon and evening, causing a bit of drifting snow.

     Another push of extremely cold air moves over for Saturday and Sunday. Lows in the -30's are likely for Sunday in particular and highs will be in the -20's for both days.

     Another one-day warmup for Monday as a system moves southwards from the high arctic into northern Manitoba. This could bring a bit of snow Monday, but I'm not expecting much. Frigid air moves in once again behind the system. It looks like colder than normal conditions will remain for the remainder of the month.

     So far, it appears likely this February will finish among the top 25 coldest on record since 1873.

     1981-2010 normal highs for the next 7 days range around -5°C to -7°C and normal lows around -16 or -17°C.

12 comments:

  1. With the Great Lakes ice cover at 85.4% yesterday surpassing last years on the same date, do you think that a repeat of the last two years cold spring weather pattern is more of a certainty.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I assume the Great Lakes would have more of a direct cooling effect on Ontario rather than us here.

      Delete
    2. Only one other periods consecutive years over 70 % frozen 77 78 79'and seem to recall some late springs for those years.

      Delete
    3. Yeah I'm not liking how long range are trending right now into March. Certainly looks cold to at least begin the month right now. Too early to say what the rest of the month will bring but optimism is fading quickly.

      Delete
  2. REGINA has been added to the record books. For now, only daily temperature records are featured. Monthly temperature records will be added next, but I am not sure when I'll get the time to add them yet. I'll have to torturously go through precipitation data this summer before adding it as well. Note that I have quality corrected the data so be sure to check the quality corrections page if you are curious.

    Interestingly, 7 record highs were broken in Regina this past January: 2 record high maximums and 5 record high minimums.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Just goes to show that snowpack is not the only factor in whether you get a early spring or a later one. Can anyone honestly say that they are surprised about this at this point. If you have lived here long enough you know what a milder December and January does not necessarily translate into an early spring. We had plus 3 and plus 4 in January. How long are we gonna have to wait to see that again? April? most likely so.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. As long as we don't get anymore big snowstorms, I still don't think the snow will stay until late April again like 2013 and 2014. The strong sun of late March and April would be enough to eat away at the snowpack even at temperatures in the minus single digits. That's really all I'm looking at. Normal for snow to disappear is the first few days of April.

      Delete
    2. In fact, of the top 10 latest dates for the winter snow pack to melt away (reach trace cm depth), only the 9th and 10th latest had snowpacks in the 20-30 cm range around this time in February. The 10th latest was April 13 and 2009. All others had significantly deeper snow packs over 30 cm and 50 cm around this time. You typically don't get extremely late snow melts like last year as a result when you have thinner winter snow packs.

      Delete
  4. New poll added to get everyone's opinion on when the snow pack will reach a trace cm this year. 2014 was April 16-23 and 2013 was after April 23.

    ReplyDelete
  5. If daytime highs in late March and early April are only in the minus single digits which by the way is well below normal for that time of year, there's no way the snow is gone in the first week of April. And even if the snow is gone in the first few days of April and that's a big if, that does not mean we are going to have a warm spring. Much like the month February has trended colder in the last 10 years or so, so has Spring. I can probably count on one hand how many warm springs we've seen in the last decade or so and that's not many.

    ReplyDelete
  6. I find it absolutely incredible how we had no problem getting daytime highs at or above the freezing mark in December and January and now that we are closer to the so called warmer season we can't get anything near that. Looks like we've had more minus 30 days this month than in December and January combined. Something's wrong with that picture. But then again you can say that was PREDICTABLE. Around here, winter's that start mild don't finish mild. Quite the opposite.

    ReplyDelete
  7. As for for that advertised warmer day tomorrow, well that's warmer in temps only. That powerful wind tomorrow will offset the milder temps which will result in a not so comfortable day. I still have doubts in that high of - 4 for tomorrow. Then it's back to the cold for rest of the week and it looks cold for at least the first 10 days of March as well.

    ReplyDelete