Blizzard brings snow day to Westman

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This article was published 05/03/2024 (605 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

The beginning of the work week was a snow day for many Brandonites after an overnight blizzard forced the closure of businesses and schools Monday morning.

The snowfall set the record for the biggest dump of white powder so far this winter, which has been unseasonably warm and dry otherwise. Environment Canada clocked the snowfall amount at 29 centimetres in Brandon, though that number is not exact due to the strong winds blowing the snow around all night, meteorologist Natalie Hazel told the Sun.

“The western area, southwest parklands, were the areas that were the most hit,” Hazel said. “We could see under clear skies, even though winds are becoming light, temperatures are going to be cold again at minus-25 and wind chill at probably somewhere around minus-33 to minus-35. Not extreme wind chill, but this is still a high risk of frostbite and people will have to pay attention to that.”

Westman school divisions, restaurants, businesses and offices issued public notices of closures, and calls for snow removal assistance flooded the local social media page. The courthouse and Brandon University closed for the day, and the Brandon Regional Health Centre navigated a shortage of staff after many workers couldn’t make it in for their shifts Monday morning.

“The snowstorm and blizzard conditions over the past 24 hours have had an impact across the region, with significant numbers of staff not being able to report to work today,” an emailed statement from Prairie Mountain Health CEO Brian Schoonbaert stated. “Staff have worked together and worked overtime to ensure patient care has not been compromised.”

Emergency departments in rural hospitals closed temporarily due to the weather conditions, the statement also said.

An ambulance got stuck in the snow near Killarney on its way to a call early Monday morning. In a statement, Shared Health confirmed the ambulance unit became stuck in the snow, but said it had not been carrying any patients.

“Emergency response services continue to respond to calls and are adapting to changing conditions,” the agency wrote.

Canada Post suspended mail delivery in Brandon, Dauphin and Portage la Prairie for the day, deciding not to send delivery people out due to the weather conditions. The federal postal service also issued a “yellow delivery service alert” for the province of Manitoba, meaning it will attempt deliveries in other parts of the province, but there will likely be delays.

The snowstorm was caused by a low-pressure system from Montana, and Hazel said weather in the Wheat City will continue to be affected by the system for the next few days. While the strong winds and the blowing snow will lessen slightly, temperatures will be continue to be chilly.

Much of the snow that restricted travel Monday morning will have passed, Hazel said, adding that the light snow in the forecast for Tuesday should not accumulate significantly.

Meanwhile, the city’s general manager of operations, Patrick Pulak, told the Sun that snow removal crews were out at midnight working on clearing roads according to the city’s priority roads schedule.

“Typically, we try and time it so that any further snowfall is going to be minimal after the snow clearing,” Pulak said. “We’re not necessarily waiting for it to finish, but certainly waiting for the vast majority of it to be done.”

Pulak said he doesn’t anticipate residential streets will be cleared until later this week, but said crews will be out working overnight on Monday. He also said the city has hired local contractors to help with clearing the snow from Brandon streets.

“The difference this time is that because of the snowfall amount, it’s making travel really difficult for smaller vehicles,” he said. “We’re trying to get out there as quick as we can … The idea is to get traffic moving again and we’ll certainly see that within the next day or two, then we’ll get back to how we do snow removal.”

The city’s snow-clearing policy follows a “priority one A” and “priority one” hierarchy, with downtown and main routes being cleared first before crews move on to clear bus routes and residential streets.

When it comes to sidewalks, Pulak said areas around schools are being prioritized for clearing.

The weekend storm also brought with it something that is more often associated with summer — thunderstorms.

Hazel said thunderstorms can happen in southwestern Manitoba any time of the year, as they are result of instability in the atmosphere.

“If the profile of the atmosphere allows for instability, and enough of it, you’ll get thunderstorms. It’s called thunder snow,” the meteorologist said. “In this case, I think we did get some weird hail-snow combination as the precipitation type.”

Still, Hazel emphasized that snowstorms in March in Manitoba are not unusual, and she expects to see more of them before the end of the winter season. Temperatures, however, are forecast to return to above average on Sunday, reaching zero degree Celsius.

A return to warmer temperatures, Hazel said, means Brandon will be subject to the freeze-thaw cycle that it experienced earlier in the winter season, making for poor driving conditions — both from ice and potholes.

“When we had that really warm weather, we had three crews fixing potholes,” Pulak said. “It’s going to depend on where we are on the snow removal, but I suspect we will have at least one crew out there doing potholes if it’s required. It’s kind of a wait and see.”

» gmortfield@brandonsun.com

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