Sunday, April 01, 2018

Cold start to April.. spring slow to arrive this year

Those hoping for a quick transition to spring as the calendar switches to April are going to be disappointed as the Prairies remain stuck in a below normal temperature pattern for at least the next 1-2 weeks.  The colder than normal pattern will mean that an extensive lingering snowpack over the Prairies and northern Plains will be slow to disappear, making it even harder for warmer temperatures to surface. As a result, expect a slow and gradual melt this year.. likely leading to the latest snowmelt here since 2014. Precipitation over southern MB looks below normal as well as the main storm track sets up south of the international border, for this week anyways. Models are hinting of a more active pattern setting up next week over the southern Prairies which may bring some accumulating snow into southern MB again by early next week (ugh!)  

As of April 1st, the highest temperature in Winnipeg so far this year has been only +5.4C (March 27th) with no hint of double digits temperatures in the near future.  In comparison, Winnipeg had already reached double digits twice in March of 2017 (including 12.3C on March 29th), and another 10 times in the first 2 weeks of April 2017 (19.8C on Apr 8th). We'll need to lose a lot more snowpack before we see temperatures like that this year.  Note that normal highs in early April in Winnipeg are +5C, rising to +10C by mid month and 15C by April 30th.   

6 comments:

  1. Pretty impressive cold for April. Looks like we could seriously challenge the record for coldest april in winnipeg since records began.

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    1. Coldest first week of April in Winnipeg since 1979, and 6th coldest since 1872. South of the border, it's been the coldest start to April on record. We moderate a bit this week (but still below normal) before we cool off again by Friday. This April has felt more like late Feb so far.. frustratingly cold. And no real big pattern flip in the near future. So yes, we could be looking at one of the coldest Aprils on record the way things are going. Gross..

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  2. Rob, there appears to hints of a possible major snowstorm fir southern Manitoba in the Friday to Saturday time frame.

    What are your thoughts on this?

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    1. Thankfully, latest models have been trending south on this system.. so it should be an issue mainly over North Dakota and Minnesota. We'll keep an eye on it to see if there's any drift north.. but so far, model have been keeping it to our south.

      In the meantime, we have a clipper system coming through southern MB Wed into Wed night. Could bring Winnipeg 2-3 cm of wet snow Wednesday evening.

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  3. First double digit temperatures of the year possible tomorrow in Winnipeg. Looking at highs of +9C, but with a southeast wind downsloping off the higher terrain to our east and enough sunshine, we may be able to hit the 10C mark Tuesday afternoon. Double digits likely by Friday into the weekend as milder airmass pushes in.. finally breaking our below normal temperature streak which began March 28th. Finally!

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