SNOW

Despite me telling Bella the snow was coming as early as Sunday, my two year old Terrier was as surprised as everyone else when she stepped outside this morning. (ValleyWX pic)

One word this morning, snow! Despite the warnings, lots are being caught off guard today with no winter tires, snow brushes and such. The first snow seems to come as a surprise to all and this morning is no different. Roads off island are in very poor shape, snow covered and slippery with reduced visibility. Highway 15 south is closed near St. Jerome because of a major accident. From the south shore, bridges are slow and commuters are experiencing up to an hour delay. Warnings remain posted across southern Quebec and northern New England and will remain so until about mid-day when the snow will taper off. About 5cm (2 inches) has fallen in Montreal with close to 10cm in northern Vermont and along the US border. Radar shows several more hours of snow before it ends with a storm total of 10cm forecast. Temperatures will be close to the freezing point all day. Winds are gusty this morning out of the northeast up to 40km/h reducing visibilities especially south of the city. In the last hour Montreal Trudeau Airport is reporting snow with northeast winds gusting to 33km/h and a windchill of -9C.

Once this early taste of winter passes today we can expect clearing skies and mild weather into the weekend, so most of the snow will melt. The storm responsible for the snow in Quebec and freezing rain last night in Ontario is now over southern New York state and moving east into the Atlantic. It will deepen rapidly and pound Atlantic Canada with up to 30cm of snow and strong winds later today.