March going out like a lion as major winter storm set to impact North Dakota, northern Minnesota, NW Ontario, SE Manitoba Monday

RDPS model valid Monday evening
showing large winter storm system
grazing southern Manitoba 

The never ending winter of 2013-14 is set to close out March with a bang as a major winter storm develops over the central US later this weekend, bringing heavy snow and strong winds to the Dakotas and northern Minnesota by Monday. The bulk of the heaviest snow with this storm is expected to fall mainly south and east of Manitoba, however the southern Red River Valley and SE Manitoba will likely get snow from this system along with strong winds and blowing snow. This would include Emerson, Steinbach and areas close to the Ontario border. Current indications are that Winnipeg will be on the northern edge of this large storm system, but some snow is also possible here Monday along with cold northerly winds. Note that Winnipeg will see worse conditions if the storm tracks further north, so it's important to keep updated on the progress of this storm as it develops over the next day or two.  

Blizzard watches (light green) and
winter storm watches (blue) are in
effect south of the US border 

This storm has the potential to be a major snow producer over the Red River valley of North Dakota with amounts of 20-30 cm possible Sunday night into Monday night. In addition, strong northerly winds will cause extensive blowing and drifting snow with blizzard conditions likely over much of eastern North Dakota. In fact, a blizzard watch has been issued for much of eastern North and South Dakota from late Sunday through Monday night. Travellers should be prepared for poor driving conditions and possible road closures south of the border with this storm. This storm will also impact NW Ontario Monday into Tuesday as it heads east, so be prepared for poor travelling conditions if you're heading into northwest Ontario early next week.

Projected snowfall amounts (inches) from WPC/NOAA. Map shows swath of heaviest snow setting up between Grand Forks and Fargo through northern Minnesota into NW Ontario where 20-30 cm is possible Sunday night into Monday night  

Cold end to March.. but a gradual moderating trend next week. Hopeful signs that we may be finally turning the corner in April?

March will be ending much like it began.. below normal (although not quite as cold as the the -37C we had on March 1st!) Clear skies and light winds will allow temperatures to drop to the -20C mark yet again early Friday, which would be the 15th time this month with a daily temperature of -20C or lower (normally, March only sees 5 such days in Winnipeg, and usually in the first half of the month). After a chilly start, Friday should see a nice afternoon with highs near -5C, still well below normal for this time of year, but feeling much nicer with sunny skies and light winds. The weekend looks somewhat unsettled as a weak clipper system tracks across southern Manitoba. This system will push a warm front across the area with a chance of some light snow ahead of it Saturday morning, before southerly winds bring in milder air for the afternoon as temperatures climb above the freezing mark to +2C in Winnipeg (which is actually normal for this time of year)  We may even see our first rain since early November Saturday night as a band of showers moves through the Red River valley ahead of a cold front. The mild air will be short lived however as the system advances east Sunday, with brisk northerly winds developing behind the system Sunday bringing falling temperatures. This will set the stage for a cold last day of March on Monday with temperatures some 10-15C below normal. March will likely finish with an average temperature around -12.7C in Winnipeg, about 7C below normal (normal March temperature is -5.8C based on 1981-2010 averages) and the coldest March in Winnipeg since 1996 (average temperature of -13.0C).  And according to local Winnipeg weather statistician "JJ" (from Winnipeg weather blog), this would make this the coldest December-March period in Winnipeg in 115 years (since the winter of 1898-99)  In other words, we've just been through the coldest 4 month stretch in Winnipeg in over a century!

(Check out this creative tribute to our endless winter to the "Sounds of Silence"  - Winnipeg Free Press)

But the news isn't all grim. The outlook for the rest of next week calls for a moderating trend with temperatures climbing through the week, with highs rising above the freezing mark by mid to late week. There are hopeful signs that this MAY be the start of a more significant and prolonged pattern change to milder weather as we get into mid April. But be forewarned, Aprils following very cold winters in Winnipeg are usually colder than normal.. thanks to a later than usual snowmelt. Hopefully, a milder start to April will accelerate the return of spring to southern Manitoba.  

Frigid first weekend of "spring".. late season -30C weather over southern Manitoba as cold Marches on

The official first weekend of spring was anything but springlike over southern Manitoba as a frigid Arctic airmass brought abnormally cold temperatures to the area, averaging some 15-20C below normal for late March.  After a brisk Saturday when temperatures struggled to an afternoon high of -13C in Winnipeg (along with -25 windchills), clear skies and light winds allowed temperatures to bottom out to a frigid -28.4C at Winnipeg airport early Sunday morning. Although well below normal (average highs are now +2c, lows -8C), it was not a record low for the day (-32.2C on March 23 1974)  Temperatures this morning were even colder outside the city, with several sites recording lows below -30C, abnormally late for such temperatures even for southern MB.

Cold spots across southern Manitoba (March 23 2014)

Great Falls ........  -33.6C  (Pine Falls)

Gimli ..................  -33.4C

Fisher Branch ....  -32.2C

Wasagaming .....  -32.3C

Indian Bay...........  -32.0C (Falcon Lake) 

Pinawa ..............   -31.5C     

Victoria Beach ...   -31.0C

The cold conditions are just an extension of what southern Manitoba has been experiencing for the last 4 months now with consistently below normal temperatures. Over the past 9 weeks for example, only 9 days have been above normal in Winnipeg. The cold conditions will gradually ease over the next few days but temperatures will remain below normal much of the week before a moderating trend gets temperatures closer to normal by the weekend. So far, March is averaging around -13C in Winnipeg, well below the average March temperature of -5.8C (1981-2010 normal)  The below normal temperatures this week will ensure that March finishes as the city's 6th consecutive month below normal. 

Spring arrives.. on the calendar only..

Projected snowfall amounts (cm)
tonight into midday Friday

Spring officially arrived at 11:57 am this morning, but it looks like Old Man Winter didn't get the memo as he gets ready to send another wintery blast across southern Manitoba tonight into Friday. A storm system over southern Saskatchewan this afternoon will track across North Dakota tonight into Minnesota Friday, spreading an area of snow across southern Manitoba tonight. Precipitation may even start as some rain or freezing rain south of the TransCanada highway to the international border this evening before changing to snow as the evening progresses. Snow will overspread southern Manitoba tonight with the bulk of the snowfall expected mainly over the southern RRV into SE MB towards the US border. (NOTE: Winter storm warnings are in effect south of the border) Snow will likely spread into Winnipeg this evening with 2 or 3 cm possible overnight. As the storm system heads east, northerly winds will increase on the backside of the system early Friday bringing much colder air from the Arctic. Strong north winds gusting to 70 or 80 km/h Friday morning will cause blowing and drifting snow in open areas, with poor traveling conditions likely outside the Perimeter, especially over the southern RRV. Things should generally improve in the afternoon and evening as winds ease off, however temperatures will be falling through the day with readings near minus 15C by evening making for icy conditions after today's melt. This latest blast of wintery weather will be the start of yet another spell of below normal temperatures across southern MB that will likely persist much of next week. This will ensure that March ends up as the 6th consecutive month below normal in Winnipeg.    

UPDATE: Actual snowfall amounts from Thursday night storm system (map courtesy of NWS Grand Forks, amounts in inches).  The storm system had a fairly narrow area of heavier snowfall mainly south of the US border into NW Ontario where 10-20 cm was reported. Snowfall amounts dropped off sharply over southern Manitoba with only 1 or 2 cm over the southern RRV. Little or no snow fell in Winnipeg.

Winnipeg snowfall - by the numbers

It's been a snowy winter in Winnipeg this year.  Snowfall started in mid November and has not quit, with persistent cold making the snow pile up to heights we haven't seen in a while.  Surely this has to be one of the snowiest winters on record for Winnipeg, right? Well, not really.  As of March 18th, our total snowfall this winter has been 151 cm (since October 1st)  That's well above the normal seasonal snowfall of 114 cm that usually falls in Winnipeg between October and May (based on 1981-2010 average for Winnipeg airport) And we still have a good 4-6 weeks of potential snowfall left this season to add to the total.

But as you can see from the table on the left, we still have a ways to go to even get in the top 10 snowiest winters of all time in Winnipeg, never mind the snowiest ever.  In 140 years of records, only 7 winters have cracked the 200 cm mark, with the snowy winter of 1955-56 topping the list at a whopping 252.6 cm, over twice the normal snowfall for the city. Most recently, the winter of 1996-97 has been the last winter to crack the 200 cm mark, thanks in large part to a record April blizzard of 48 cm that led to the "Flood of the Century" that spring. So although we still can get some good snowfalls between now and May, we'd have to get at least 60 cm over the next month to crack the top 5 snowiest winters in the city.

Looking at a graph of winter snowfall in Winnipeg since 1873 reveals some interesting observations. Most notable is how erratic Winnipeg snowfall is from year to year, with wild swings from well above "normal" to well below. In fact, it's tough to say what "normal" is, since snowfall varies so much every winter. One way to define "normal" is to look at a longer term average. Looking at the 30 year running average (red line), one can see that snowfall has averaged roughly 125 cm for much of Winnipeg's history since 1873. That average started to dip in the 1970s and 1980s with several below normal snow seasons during that time. As a result, our 30 year running average dipped to a low of 110 cm by the 1990s. Since then, average snowfall has been trending up again, with a trend towards that 125 cm average thanks to the last few winters. Perhaps this is nature's way of reverting back to more typical snowfall amounts for this part of the world.
        

Graph of winter season snowfall in Winnipeg since 1873
Red line shows 30 year running average (cm)

The graph also shows another interesting tidbit. The least snowy winter in Winnipeg was way back in 1877-78, during Winnipeg's warmest winter on record. Only 31 cm of snow fell that entire winter, during the "year without a winter" that was a result of an unusually strong El Nino that year that had worldwide impacts on weather, rainfall and crops. December 1877 was virtually snowfree in Winnipeg (only 0.5 cm the whole month) and no month that entire winter exceeded 8 cm of total snowfall. Incredible.  (*NOTE: Some recent information suggests that Winnipeg may have experienced a significant snowfall later that spring on May 2 1878. In a Department of Transport study on the "Climate of Winnipeg" (Labelle, Brown, and Hasinoff, June 7 1966), it notes that the heaviest May snowfall on record in Winnipeg was 10.7 inches (27.2 cm) on May 2 1878. Officially in the digitized climate archives online, snowfall for Winnipeg on that date is listed as only 1.8 cm, or 0.7 inches. It's possible the data was incorrectly entered into the climate database as 0.7" instead of 10.7". Note that the nearby St Andrews climate site recorded 12" of snow (30 cm) on May 2-3rd 1878, so the potential is there that Winnipeg had much heavier snow that day than the current archive shows. I will update this info if and when I hear more.)       

One last but important note. Snowfall observations are no longer taken at Winnipeg airport which was the official source for snowfall observations in the city since 1938. (St John's College took snowfall observations in Winnipeg between 1873-1938)  Due to automation and a change in observing responsibilities, snowfall records at the airport stopped in 2007. Since then, snowfall readings for Winnipeg have been based on snowfall observations taken from my Charleswood observing station, an official climate station with Environment Canada. I take two snowfall readings a day from October to May, including snow depth, and send the reports to Environment Canada who archive them in their climate database. Snowfall readings at my site will not always be representative of snowfall at the airport, but at least we have some record of snowfall for the city, in the absence of official snowfall data from Winnipeg airport.