Hello all, quieter week of weather for Southern Ontario with the heat now long gone it's been back to average even slightly cooler than average days and cold enough at night for a touch of frost. Almost unbelievably, snow is the buzzword this afternoon across parts of the area, particulary north of Toronto as EC highlight here :
Special weather statement for:
City of Toronto
Windsor - Essex - Chatham-Kent
Sarnia - Lambton
Elgin
London - Middlesex
Simcoe - Delhi - Norfolk
Dunnville - Caledonia - Haldimand
Oxford - Brant
Niagara
City of Hamilton
Halton - Peel
York - Durham
Huron - Perth
Waterloo - Wellington
Dufferin - Innisfil
Grey - Bruce
Barrie - Orillia - Midland.
A mixed bag of precipitation for Southern Ontario.
---------------------------------------------------------------------
==discussion==
A disturbance from the American Midwest will track just south of Lake
Erie this evening giving a variety of inclement weather to Southern
Ontario.
A light snowfall is expected north of a line from Central Lake Huron
to Toronto with a mixed bag of rain and snow to the south.
Over Extreme Southwestern Ontario showers and thunderstorms,
accompanied by small hail, will taper off this evening.
In the greater Toronto area wet snow is expected to develop early
this evening then end after midnight. Northern portions of the
Toronto region can expect 2 to 4 cm, with little or no snow
accumulation expected over southern sections of the city.
Late this evening there will be the risk for some freezing rain in a
swath from Southern Lake Huron to Niagara, especially over higher
elevations.
Locally hazardous road conditions can be expected in the
precipitation this evening as temperatures fall to near
Or just below freezing in many locales. In addition, poor
visibilities can be expected in bursts of heavier snow.
You couldn't make this up! Currently just 3c in Hamilton, that's a full 24c lower than last week's high and cold enough for at least some mixed wintery precipation tonight for the City of Hamilton area and maybe some snow and treterous freezing rain across hillier parts of the area. Certainly a bigger risk of accumulating snow in and around T.O. particulary for areas N & E of the city.
While not unusual by any stretch to get snow in late March or indeed early April, after what went before it's a major switch and a shock to the system! Parts of Upstate NY & MI will actually seen snowsqualls and quite substantial accumulations in favoured spots from this system which is now just approaching Hamilton at this hour.
The weather appears from what i've read from family back in Ayrshire to be following a very similar trend back in Scotland, with incredible temps (record breaking) for parts of the country and now it's cooling down with perhaps some snow in the forecast for some next week.
After this system departs Ontario, it turns drier but still cold at just 8c thru Monday.
Tallyho, you questioned the difference between the snow falling and lying depth stats in my profile. Simple answer is that while there were quite a few (however still below the norm) days of snow actually falling from the sky, on just one period during the winter (from memory) in late January when we got consecutive snowfall events which brought that total to a pretty poor 14cm. All the other occasions as i'm sure you noticed, the snow that fell, lay for a day or two and melted before the rinse/repeat cycle started from scratch. 14cm compared to 71cm in one snowfall event in Feb 2007 is very low even by average which is around 40cm at some point in the winter season.
And finally, Graeme not long now to the Blue Jays kick off their 2012 campaign in the MLB and spring training being going well. Today the Jays signed a contract of sponsership with Baseball Canada and also gained some unexpected fans from another Toronto sports team! Don't know if you've been keeping an eye on the Leafs recently, but they've been a word that begins with S quite alot lately and last night was the final straw for some in a humilating 7-1 loss to Philly. During the game, Leafs fans began singing 'Let's go Blue Jays'!!! Laughter was heard loudly around the rink and this i think shows just how far gone the hockey francise has gone since those glory days in the 60s!
Have a great weekend everyone.