Sunday, June 30, 2013

Hot week ahead as heat wave builds over western Canada

A massive upper ridge over western North America is producing some of the hottest weather in years over parts of the western US, and some of this heat will be spreading across western Canada and the Prairies this week. BC and Alberta will see the hottest weather over the Canada Day weekend before the heat spreads east over the eastern Prairies during the upcoming week. For Winnipeg, sunny warm weather will prevail today and Canada Day with temperatures in the upper 20s along with light winds and comfortable humidity.  The heat starts turning up Tuesday and Wednesday as temperatures climb into the low 30s under sunny skies. A weak front may bring some scattered thunderstorms by Thursday and Friday, with slightly cooler weather expected over the weekend.  

54 comments:

  1. Look at Tadoule Lake, already 26C at 10am, going past 30C today! Break out the bug shirts.

    Garth

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  2. I think you are correct Rob. Something is definitely wrong with the CBC forecast graphic again. It was just updated, but the days merely shifted one day forward and all the temperatures stayed the same (high of only 22C again for tomorrow!).

    As you mentioned the CTV graphic is good (they use the same software so it must be an operator issue).

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  3. I noticed a slight haze today and see that my UV readings today are not as high as yesterday. Sure enough, visible satellite imagery shows a thin layer of smoke aloft over Central/eastern Manitoba advecting south over southern MB.

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  4. It's thick enough to lower the UV?! Well there ya go, letting the forest burn helps prevent skin cancer ;)

    Garth

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  5. I see forecast highs for later this week have been substantially downgraded from yesterday which had mid thirties for late week to now upper twenties and low end thirties...seems more reasonable than mid thirties.

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  6. Rob I see E.C. Is calling for increased cloudiness tomorrow. Do you anticipate this?

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  7. Rob, Just want to tell you I have appreciated your Obs and blog for years now. We live on Westwood drive, prob. across the river from you, so feel you are our closest weather site to know what is happening here. Thx once more. Barb

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  8. Mark.. There's a band of high level clouds to our west that will move in by afternoon. It should be thin enough for a least some hazy sun to get through. Happy Canada Day!

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  9. Appreciate the kind comments Barb.. Glad you find the site useful. I run this site to give people a little more insight into the weather than you get from a basic forecast. I wish I could dedicate more time to it as weather can be so complex and variable even within the size of a city, but I'm glad that people still can get some helpful info here.

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  10. Rob. Current Woodside radar image shows a distinct circle of echos approx 100kM out. I'm guessing this is somehow related to atmospheric conditions and the phantom image that often appears west of Lake Manitoba. It's interesting that TWN is actively 'tracking' these false images on their Futurecast page.

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  11. June 2012 mean temp = 17.8
    June 2013 mean temp = 17.6
    I'd say that is pretty similar and above normal.

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  12. EC issued a SWS about the haze:

    Special air quality statement for:
    Southern Manitoba
    Central and Northern Manitoba.

    Smoke from forest fires in Northern Manitoba tonight and
    Tuesday.

    ---------------------------------------------------------------------
    ==discussion==
    Forest fires will continue to give smoky conditions to parts of
    Northern Manitoba. Downwind of these fires, visibilities will be
    restricted with a moderate to high health risk air quality health
    index. The visibility restriction and reduced air quality will be
    most pronounced at night, and then ease during the daytime hours.

    Some diffuse smoke has also drifted into Southern Manitoba.
    This will give slightly hazy conditions, and a red sunrise and
    sunset. The stagnant flow over the province may give a moderate
    health risk air quality health index to parts of Southern Manitoba
    tonight and possibly into Tuesday.

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  13. Also noticed that the AQHI sensor was knocked out and has been for the last 24h (all N/As).

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  14. 40.5C in Lytton, BC yesterday.

    Warmest temperature recorded in Canada since 2009.

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  15. Also, Salmon Arm, BC had a humidex reading of 45 yesterday, highest this year.

    Their dewpoint was 24.1C which ties Drummondville's dewpoint record this year.

    Sorry guys, I just love stats. :)

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  16. Rolling power outages again in Alberta according to twitter reports today due to the heat. Incredible comparing that to here, because we're talking about humidex values only between 35 and 40 there, something we see every single year here and never have those problems. ''It's all relative'' because it's almost a desert in parts of southern Alberta.

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  17. Very true. Evidently Edmonton has hit the 40C humidex mark for the first time on record today. We do that almost every summer!

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  18. Kind of neat watching the CB tops getting sheared off by the jet stream today (on the vis satellite).

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  19. I see YWG Airport is a cool bias this evening....25C at 7PM while everywhere else in the city and across the province is about 4 or 5 degrees warmer. Strange.

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  20. The question now would be, why is the temperature tanking so quickly at YWG Airport this evening and every other station across the province is some 4 to 6 degrees warmer. Was just outside and it's clearly warmer than 24C.

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  21. There are a few pockets of cooler air around southern MB, including at Robs right now. There was some good cold outflow from several thunderstorms today, so perhaps that's the reason. Still above 30C from The Pas to Pisew Falls to Pukatawagan this hour (8pm). HOT!

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  22. 32C at the Forks and 29C at the airport?

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  23. Anyone else can't get onto the weather.gc.ca site? It's been down for quite a while (at least an hour?). Their Datamart is also down, so SpotWx won't have the latest EC model runs.

    Garth

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  24. Environment Canada website is down.

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  25. Paul,
    the reason for that is because there are pockets of colder air in southern MB dew to the cold front coming through north of hear.

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  26. EC is back up again. Though they have no current conditions at the moment.

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  27. +1 confirm to both it being back up and CCs still MIA.

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  28. I wonder what happened. Would it be related to the power outage in Montreal? Nothing on the Datamart seems to have been updated since around 4pm.

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  29. Looks like they're still having issues at CMC. Forecasts aren't updated on Weatheroffice and a tornado watch still appears in effect for SE Sask when nothing is out.

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  30. Apparently it's not related to the power outage. Just a major systems crash.

    Garth

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  31. When's the last time a tornado was confirmed in southern Manitoba? Was it all the way back in 2010? Just seems like there's been an abnormal lack of tornadoes in this province lately.

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  32. Updated forecast for Winnipeg seems a little pessimistic (Mainly cloudy. 60% chance of showers with risk of a tstm) Lots of sunshine moving in now as morning clouds move out. Will likely see some convective clouds building up this afternoon as weak upper trough moves in from western MB.. perhaps triggering some scattered thunderstorms late afternoon with highs again reaching 30C. But should see a fair amount of sun before then.

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  33. Rob, is it pretty safe to say better luck next time as far as thunderstorms are concerned today?

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  34. Yeah... it was a slim chance to begin with, but doesn't look like anything's brewing. Ho hum, just another gloriously sunny 30C day!

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  35. Is that a possible split in systems Saturday? If so, this is 2011 and 2012 all over again.. Never thought we would get a 3rd straight summer like this, usually you can count on some change after this long.

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  36. Rob, what does the storm threat look like for Saturday? Severe weather possible?

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  37. For those interested, the city put up a PDF for the 6/20 heavy rainfall event:

    http://winnipeg.ca/waterandwaste/pdfs/drainageFlooding/rainfallReports/130620Map.pdf

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  38. Saturday looking interesting for some thunderstorms across southern MB with potential for heavy rainfall. Local amounts of 25-50 mm possible with stronger storms. Thunderstorm activity over southern SK today will spread into SW MB tonight into early Saturday, then continue to spread eastward into RRV by midday. NAM/WRF guidance suggest a possible split of the storms into the interlake and south of us along the US border into ND with minimal activity in Winnipeg. But we'll have to see how this convection develops. But it does appear that ourt week long streak of sunshine and warmth will be coming to an end this weekend.. at least temporarily.

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  39. >> Anonymous said...When's the last time a tornado was confirmed in southern Manitoba? Was it all the way back in 2010? Just seems like there's been an abnormal lack of tornadoes in this province lately.

    Anonymous.. We had 2 brief weak tornadoes last year in southern MB, an F0 near Lac Du Bonnet on July 30th, and another F0 near Minto on June 20th. Only 3 in all of MB last year, and only 4 in 2011. Average is about 8/year so we've been below normal for a couple years now at least. Our last big year was 2007 with the Elie and Pipestone events.. Since then, AB and SK have being seeing a lot more severe summer weather than southern MB.

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  40. Rob, it looks like it's gonna cooldown somewhat over the next few days.
    Is there more heat in the works for us sometime next week or beyond?

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  41. Long range models are showing the western ridge building up again by the midle of next week with some of that heat spreading east to us by the end of the week. So after a cooler weekend and start to the new week, temps should be increasing again by the end of the week.

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  42. Rob, are the parameters good for severe weather tomorrow or not likely?

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  43. Anon - The FOCN45 bulletin is often a good place to find detailed info about severe weather.

    http://kamala.cod.edu/Canada/latest.focn45.CWWG.html

    From todays:
    SO WE EXPECT A FEW SEVERE THUNDERSTORMS TO DEVELOP OVER SRN SK TODAY
    EAST OF THE SFC TROF. WITH FREEZING LEVEL VERY HIGH AND HIGH
    PRECIPITABLE WATER CONTENT (NEAR 40 MM) MAIN DANGER WILL BE HEAVY
    RAIN DUE TO SLOW STORM MOTION AND EFFICIENT RAIN PRODUCTION,
    HOWEVER FORECAST SOUNDINGS SHOW LOOPING HODOGRAPHS EAST OF THE
    TROUGH, EXPECTED TO BE NEAR MOOSE JAW BY 06/00Z. SO THERE IS A
    CHANCE FOR THE DEVELOPMENT OF SUPERCELL WITH LARGE HAIL AND DAMAGING
    WINDS. STORMS WILL WEAKEN AFTER DARK.

    SATURDAY LOOKS LIKE IT'LL HAVE A SIMILAR SETUP SOMEWHERE IN SOUTHERN
    MANITOBA, ALTHOUGH THE MIDLEVEL WINDS COULD BE A TOUCH STRONGER.

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  44. What a great day compared to what they had announced this morning.

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  45. There's really not a lot happening storm-wise or even rain-wise here... It's a lovely warm day out there again though! Just seems like whenever they say it's going to rain, it ends up being gloriously sunny all day long.

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  46. Lightnings are sparkling on the western horizon. Looks like storms are gonna hit Winnipeg very soon.

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  47. I saw a flash or two of lightning and heard some thunder last night... but I was probably awake for all of 10 seconds.

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  48. Incredible chilly conditions in northern Ontario today. Timmins expecting a high of 8°C... normal high is 25°C! That daytime high is also just 5 degrees warmer than the record low for today.

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  49. FYI - The CBC MB forecast graphic is acting goofy again, and likely will for several weeks as JS is away for most of July.

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  50. I guess we should just ignore CBC forecast icons on the weekend. They seem OK during the week.. hopefully it corrects tomorrow.

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  51. Got home today from St. Malo camping. The storm between 2:30 and 3:30 last night was pretty intense with constant lightning and alot of thunder, not too bad for wind. Luckily the only thing I had to fish out of the lake was the dog's bed. Sure looks like Winnipeg didn't get any rain.

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  52. Barely a drop of rain in Winnipeg last night. Storms wimped out or split around the city as line went through. Some good lightning (my wife tells me) but otherwise... not much of a storm for us.

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  53. Rob, what does the storm potential look like for this week? Severe weather possibly?

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  54. Could see some thunderstorms with heavy rain Monday night into Tuesday.. maybe some hail with soem stronger cells. See my latest post..

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