Although most of the province was unaffected, if you live in Saskatoon, Hepburn, Hafford, or Blaine Lake, you could have seen up to six centimetres of snow fall overnight.
Environment Canada Meteorologist Terri Lang says a thin strand of a weather system moved west to east across the province last night, bringing snow and ice pellets to a very localized, unsuspecting area.
“If you got underneath that line for a while, then it accumulated more, and when you have one of the biggest cities in Saskatchewan get underneath that line, a lot of people noticed that the forecast didn’t quite nail it.”
Lang says the strand of storms did appear on Environment Canada weather models, but it looked rather weak for anyone who wasn’t directly underneath it.
“Farther to the south it kind of petered out. Even Clavet, they didn’t record much at all. Only two centimetres worth.”
Although temperatures weren’t high enough to see any reports of freezing rain, the roads, especially in and around Saskatoon, are still quite icy today.
“I think with that melting that we had, and then that cold front whistled through and the temperatures dropped, everything just froze up and then BOOM, we got the snow on top of it.”
She advises drivers to check the Highway Hotline before they head out, as the fresh snow mixed with the freeze-thaw cycle we’re in can create quite a slippery situation.
Looking ahead, Lang says there are no big weather systems in the forecast, but the temperature roller coaster is expected to continue until a period of warm-weather reprieve next week.
