THUNDER BAY -- Environment Canada's special weather statement for Thunder Bay on Friday has been upgraded to a snowfall warning.
A storm expected to drop 10 to 15 centimetres of snow on the city in its first snowfall of the winter has now been re-evaluated to estimates as high as 15 to 20 centimetres. Outside the city west to Atikokan and east to Greenstone and on Lake Superior's north shore, up to 30 centimetres of snow could fall.
"At this point in time, we're going to see a transition situation," said meteorologist Geoff Coulson.
"The system's going to initially move in when temperatures are just over the freezing mark but as we drop below the freezing mark, we'll see that change to snow. At 10 a.m., freezing rain with that as well the highest amount of falling snow and ice pellets will be falling Friday evening."
The city's road maintenance division is on point, having tested all winter equipment in October.
Roads manager Brad Adams said the entire 64-person staff is expected to be working on some 35 pieces of road-clearing machinery, plus 15 sidewalk plows.
"Typically, we're out at 2 a.m. if we have sufficient snow by then," Adams said.
"We'll have our arterial collectors done by 9 a.m. If we have sufficient snow, we will move into residentials and complete that within three days."
No calendar parking has yet been announced.
When Kal Tire opened on Thursday, there were some 30 people waiting to have snow tires put on their vehicles. They were added to those that had been left overnight. The parking lot around the building was full with some triple parked and the overflow parked along the street.
Assistant store manager Mark Hahnle counted himself among those that felt winter had crept up.
"It started yesterday as soon as they heard the 's' word -- the 'snow' word -- people have been rushing in," he said.
"A lot of people, myself too, (feel) if you see green grass, it's nice and warm out, you're still walking around in a shirt, you're not expecting it and you realize it's in the middle of November. We normally would have cold and snow by now."
