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Winter wonderland and traffic mayhem expected leading up to Christmas

Dec 19, 2017 | 12:23 PM

NANAIMO — “It just doesn’t look like a nice place to be.”

Environment Canada meteorologist Armel Castellan told NanaimoNewsNOW heavy snowfall on Tuesday, the area should brace for more interesting and unusual weather on Thursday.

“It’s not so much a storm…cold air traveling right over Georgia Strait, which is relatively warm and that’s very unstable,” he said. “Nanaimo is a prime candidate for it as the cold air rushes over the Strait, picks up the moisture…and you can see streamers of snow.”

Castellan predicted the weather would be incredibly specific and localized on Thursday.

“You can have parts of the city that see nothing at all and others that will see five, sometimes even 10 cm. in these types of events.”

Once that system passes though, he said the skies should clear and remain cold.

“The chances of a white Christmas just went way up compared to the 1- to 15 per cent chance Nanaimo normally sees.”

Castellan said Tuesday’s storm is a great example of how varied weather can be, with Nanaimo hammered by snow while the Comox Valley dealt with only rain. He said it was snowing heavily in Saanich at his office while it was only raining in Victoria.

The heavy snowfall on Tuesday wasn’t predicted in Monday afternoon and night weather casts.

“That’s the nature of the game, it’s the fluid dynamics of the atmosphere,” he said. “When things are very active, especially in the winter time and we’re dealing with snow and rain, it becomes a much shorter time line where the confidence is high and tapers off very quickly.”

However, he said Environment Canada had talked to emergency groups about some extreme weather and high winds at this time and their forecast was relatively accurate, though it did change early Tuesday morning.

“There’s some pretty good high fives going on in the storm centre today and to make some of those adjustments is par for the course.”

 

spencer@nanaimonewsnow.com

On Twitter: @spencer.sterrit