Strong storms bring relief from heatwave - produce power outages

Lightning illuminates the night sky over Ile Perrot. Strong thunderstorms Tuesday afternoon and evening brought an end to our record-breaking heatwave. (ValleyWeather Photo)

Our remarkable seven day heatwave is over in Montreal. We manged six consecutive days of temperatures over 32C (90F) at Trudeau Airport. This was an extremely rare event for the city, and a first for the month of June. The heatwave ended Tuesday evening as strong thunderstorms developed well in advance of a cold front. Before that however, we managed to set yet another record high, the third in a week. The mercury soared to 33.1C (91.5F) by 1pm, surpassing the old record of 32.7C (91F) set in 1989. On Monday, the high was 34.8C (95F), also a record, the previous was 32.2C (90F) set in 1957. That mark of 34.8C was just two tenths of a degree below the all-time June record of 35C (95F) set in 1964. Montreal averages 9 days a year of temperatures in excess of 30C (86F), Tuesday was our 12th day already in 2020.

STRONG STORMS
The end of the heatwave did not come quietly, as strong thunderstorms swept across the city from south to north. The first batch affected areas off-island to the west around 1pm, with heavy rain and strong winds. The second pulse of storms was much stronger, sweeping across the Monteregie, Island of Montreal, Laval and the North Shore, knocking out power to over 70,000 Hydro-Quebec customers, and uprooting several trees. A wind gust to 96 km/h (59 mph) was recorded at Trudeau Airport at 6:50pm. The number of outages in the province is down to 229 Wednesday morning, affecting 21,000 customers.

Much need rainfall accompanied the storms, with 26.7mm falling here on Ile Perrot. Less fell at Trudeau Airport, with 13.6mm recorded. While the rainfall was greatly appreciated, conditions remain very dry in many parts of the province. At this time, numerous water restrictions remain in effect, check with your municipality for exact details. The normal rainfall for May is 81.2mm and June 87mm. To date we have only received 27.8mm at Trudeau Airport for June. May was dry as well, with only 34.2mm of rain falling along with a trace of snow.

Cooler, windy weather is expected for Wednesday, with a high of 25C (77F) and gusty southwest winds to 50km/h. Enjoy the relief over the next few days, hot and humid weather is expected to return by early next week, with perhaps another significant heatwave on tap to start July.