Heavy snowfall has led to road and school closures. Meteorological services called this storm “historic.”
A winter storm of “rare” intensity for April hit central Canada this week, with heavy snowfall causing numerous road and school closures. “An event where there is 30 cm or more of snow after April 11 is rather rare,” Natalie Hasell, meteorologist at Environment Canada, told AFP.
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After that date, only two storms of this intensity have been recorded since 1902. Such forecasts for the province of Manitoba (Central) had not been recorded since 1997’s “Storm of the Century.” The weather services had warned about expecting this winter storm, calling it “historic”. Deep southeast Saskatchewan (west) and much of southern Manitoba is forecast to have 12 to 20 inches of snowfall by the end of this storm.
Up to 80 cm of snow
Specialists also expected that some areas would receive up to 80 cm of snow. But ultimately “it doesn’t look like those areas received as much rainfall,” said Natalie Hasell, “amounts have moderated somewhat since then.” However, it was “very likely” that the forecasts of 30 to 50 cm would be achieved, the expert added. On Thursday, 5 to 10 cm of additional snow was expected in the Winnipeg region, capital of Manitoba.
Many schools and roads in the province remained closed. Power outages were marginal at the Manitoba Hydro site. Airline Air Canada told AFP it plans to resume operations on Thursday with 14 scheduled flights to and from Winnipeg after canceling 21 on Wednesday.
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The alarm was lifted for Saskatchewan, a province that has to be disturbed by gusts of up to 50 km/h. Others, however, were issued for northern Ontario, with the storm now moving east of the country. The meteorological event is scheduled to wind down from Friday and end at the end of the day or in the evening.
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