Snow and cold return to Montreal to start 2025

While Christmas Eve was snowy and cold in Montreal, New Year's Eve looks more like early November. The record warmth of Monday has virtually eliminated all our snow in just a few hours. More snow is on the way however, as the weather pattern turns much colder and stormy to start 2025.

Happy New Year! 2025 will mark the 20th Anniversary of the Valley Weather Blog and the 46th year for Valley Weather. There was plenty of weather to talk about in 2024, none bigger than the billions of dollars in flood damage that occurred in Quebec from the remains of both hurricanes Beryl and Debby.

The year will end on a very mild note, we are currently 6C (43F) here on Ile Perrot, warm, but far from the 1875 record of 12.2C (54F). We did have a significant record high on Monday, reaching 11.4C (53F) at Trudeau Airport shattering the 2022 record of 8.6C (48F). Most of the snow cover has melted away, with the exception of a few patches here and there.

Winter will return however as we have a major pattern change on the way to begin 2025. It starts with deepening low pressure passing to our south across New England on New Year's Day, delivering steady precipitation across southern and eastern Ontario and Quebec. The storm will then head into Atlantic Canada.

The precipitation will start off as a messy mix of rain and snow, but as temperatures drop on Wednesday afternoon, all precipitation will change to snow. The snow will persist into Thursday morning, along with increasing winds out of the northwest and dropping temperatures. Accumulations will range from 5-10cm in valley locations to more than 15cm across the mountains of the Townships, Beauce, New York and New England. If you have travel plans on New Year's Day, expect highly changeable conditions with mixed precipitation and reduced visibility at times.

Look for windy, cold weather along with isolated flurries into the first weekend of the new year. Lows will drop into the minus teens, with daytimes highs struggling to rise above -10C (14F). The cold air will be with us well into the month of January.