Thursday, April 26, 2012

Finally a little sun

Over 20cm of snow fell in Orangeville, Ontario on Monday. CBC News
Sorry folks it has been one of those weeks where life gets in the way of weather and blogging, and as I have said often before, I hate it when that happens!

It has been a dismal weather week with lots of clouds, showers, wet snow and even some small hail since Monday's strong storm moved across the region. That system is now well north of us over Hudson Bay giving blizzard conditions to far northern Quebec. Most of us had more rain from that storm in 24 hours than we had seen in the entire month of April. I measured around 42mm here on L'Ile Perrot with closer to 30mm at the airport. Just a trace of snow fell in Montreal, but as much as 10cm fell down the 401 in the Thousand Islands and over 20cm west of Toronto in Orangeville. The snow created a bunch of accidents closing the 401 for a spell as well as cancelling school buses for thousands of students in Ontario. Despite everybody being shocked, a glance at the record books shows it was not that unusual with many historic mid and late April snowstorms over the years in Ontario and Quebec.

Today we start of with some sunshine and chilly temperatures with a light frost here on L'Ile Perrot at 0C. We will have some brief sunshine however clouds are on the increase once again as low pressure in the Ohio Valley moves northeast across New York. Temperatures may warm to around 10C or so today. Look for rain to develop later today with winds increasing to 20-40km/h. Rain overnight may mix with a few flurries before ending by morning. Another 15-20mm of rain is likely as we continue to balance the precipitation books for the month. Slow clearing arrives Friday followed by a sunny but chilly weekend with cold lows well below freezing. If you planted early be prepared to protect that vegetation this weekend as widespread frost and freezing temperatures are likely across the entire area including metro regions. It will slowly warm up next week as we welcome May and hopefully real spring.

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