“Snow-mageddon” Part 1
The Greater Toronto Area is currently being battering by heavy snow and strong winds resulting in traffic chaos and flight cancellations. Environment Canada describes the current snowstorm as being dynamic and will be followed by another two storms in the next five days. It is becoming more likely that Toronto will have a perfect white Christmas based on EC’s criteria of having 2 cm on the ground and falling snow.
The storm hit the west end of the city around 0730 this morning and spread eastward. The snowflakes this morning were small and very fine but around 1400 to 1700, it changed to heavy, big flakes. The temperatures were also falling throughout the day from -4.8 deg. C at 0700 to -11.2 deg. C at 1700 as shown in the graph below:
Strong easterly winds complicated the situation resulting in nearly zero visibility for about five hours this afternoon. Here are some wind gust reported so far:
Long Point: NNE 99 km/h
Hamilton Airport: NE 85 km/h
Burlington Lift Bridge: ENE 76 km/h
Toronto Port Authority Marina: 72 km/h
Toronto City Centre Airport: 68 km/h
Toronto Pearson: 74 km/h
Toronto Buttonville Airport: 52 km/h
As of 8:00 a.m. this morning, Toronto East York (Sunnybrook Park area) received 16.5 cm of fresh snow and 24-25 cm of snow on the ground. Due to the strong winds, drifts are very common.
If you’re curious about the greatest 24-hour December snowfall at Toronto Pearson airport, I’ve compiled the top ten for you to enjoy:
In my next weatherblog at 10:30 pm, I’ll post some pictures I took today and radar images from the storm. I’ll also have the snowfall amounts from Environment Canada so I’ll post that one too. For more weather info, visit our main site: www.TorontoForecast.com
Cheers,
Kristoffer
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