Friday ended up being quite a significant snowfall event for the Drumheller, Three Hills, Hanna regions.
Drumheller itself got around 20 centimetres of snow, which was more than what Environment and Climate Change Canada was predicting. Stingray Weather Specialist Brandon Houck explains the factors involved in why we received so much of the white stuff. “It all had to do with where the low pressure system developed. That was right over the Brooks / Medicine Hat area. Usually on the northwest side of any low pressure, that is where you are going to get more significant precipitation. Areas like Brooks and Medicine Hat barely got a skiff and then you had more significant snow in the Hanna / Drumheller area, with more of an easterly flow.”
Mother Nature continues her unpredictability as only a few days later we are into double digit temperatures. Houck confirms that this is due to a weather system off the Pacific Ocean. “We got a Pacific air mass replacing the cold Arctic air mass that took over for the weekend. That cold Arctic air mass is centered over Eastern Canada, while we get the right side of the jet stream and the upper ridge in the jet stream. With the Pacific air mass, that allows for warmer than average temperatures for most of Alberta, and even British Columbia.”
It looks like we might have these milder temperatures for the next bit of time. “We will probably cool off a little bit on Wednesday but I think we are going to bump the temperature back up Thursday and Friday to the mid to upper teens. We’re going to see this last through the rest of this week and early next week we may see a little adjustment back to more average temperatures.”
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