If you were in and around Drumheller on Saturday we saw quite a change in weather, accompanied by a significant wind.
According to Stingray Weather Specialist, Brandon Houck, the wind was part of a cold front that rolled in. “We had a very, very, sharp cold front move through. We had temperatures in the low to mid 30’s, I think Drumheller got to 35 degrees on Saturday afternoon, so definitely one of the hottest places in Canada, then this front came through. There wasn’t enough energy to produce any thunderstorms. If there were, I think the winds would have been stronger. There was a significant amount of wind sheer with this (front). That allowed for some pretty strong winds gusting from 70 to 90 km/h.” Houck said that he noted the winds in Drumheller reaching around 72 km/h and up to 93 km/h in the Red Deer region.
The winds in Drumheller did create some havoc with a few trees taking the brunt of it. One, in the parking lot of the Long Branch Saloon along North Dinosaur Trail snapped from the force. It was cleaned up by Sunday afternoon. As a weather forecaster, Houck notes that they were expecting the strong winds but expected a stormier evening Saturday. “The thunderstorms didn’t really materialize as forecasted, across the central region of the province, so we ended up with all the wind. All the ingredients were there for some strong winds to develop with this front but we didn’t get the thunderstorms. It was a good thing as the winds would have been up to about 110 km/h with the thunderstorms.”
As for the upcoming week, Houck shares that we have a chance of seeing some thunderstorms. “Looking ahead, we do have a chance of showers and possible thunderstorms today, but nothing as wild as Saturday night, probably more like pulse like thunderstorms. We are going to stay a bit on the unsettled side for the next few days, temperatures on the cool side, and we start to crank up the heat by the end of the week.”
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