THUNDER BAY -- A meteorologist with Environment Canada says the blast of freezing rain will continue to play havoc on the city’s street for the next day or two.
A significant storm moved into the region on Tuesday evening with a mix of ice pellets and freezing rain, which is expected to continue through Thursday.
Warning preparedness meteorologist Geoff Coulson said this weather system won’t be going anywhere.
“We may see a little bit more ice pellet activity mixing in with the system during the course of today and tonight, but with the resurgence of moisture Thursday we could get another shot of freezing rain,” Coulson said.
Environment Canada received reports in and around Thunder Bay from anywhere between five to ten millimeters of ice accretion overnight.
Coulson said he’s been working as a meteorologist for more than 30 years and he can’t remember a storm similar to this one.
“We’ve had episodes of freezing rain, ice pellets, and a messy system go through Thunder Bay over the course of the last number of years, but in terms of the stubbornness of this system – I can’t remember a setup like this one lasting this long,” he said.
There’s a big area of high pressure with cold air up over the far north and it’s pumping the cold air down into the areas to the north of Lake Superior and to the west of Lake Superior, Coulson said.
“The huge amounts of moisture bringing up from the American deep south with these series of systems are just locking in the area for this freezing rain situation,” Coulson said.
The city will be dealing with a mixture of freezing rain and ice pellets throughout Wednesday and most likely back to freezing rain for most of Thursday.
Late Thursday, the city can expect to see the freezing rain transition over to snow before the systems goes away by early Friday morning.
“I think we are going to see a return to the sunshine, but not quite getting temperatures back to where they should be for this time of year,” Coulson said.
“The last few days of April and even into the first week of May we are going to be dealing with temperatures somewhat cooler than normal.”
Coulson added the meteorologists are already keeping an eye on more potential messy weather coming in to lead off the month of May.
The city could see another messy mix of rain or snow, so more active weather is in store for the area for the beginning of May.
