Spring should warm up – eventually, says senior climatologist

“So, I think people are getting a little testy. Even people who like winter are saying, enough’s enough,” he said. “Now we want to see it warm up. But nature doesn’t hear us. She doesn’t really pay attention to want we want, our needs and desires are not often met. You’re just going to have to be a little bit more patient.”

Even this week, while it seems warmer, temperatures are roughly between normal and five degrees below normal. Phillips explained the phenomenon called “La Nina” brought more Arctic air to the region, while the chinooks common to southern Alberta were mostly absent. In fact, Phillips said there were days when the North Pole was warmer than Lethbridge.

A normal year, he said, would see five days of -20 or colder in Lethbridge. This winter there were 17 of them, and there were even days when it was close to -38.

“When the north is warmer, and you have less ice, you would think south of that would be kind of warmer temperatures; you must be getting a lot of Pacific air,” Phillips explained. “Well, the Pacific/Atlantic air was rushing to the north. But what it was doing, it was almost like a bowling ball and bowling pins. It was kind of just screwing up the pattern and allowing the colder air that sits up there to head south.

“We talk a lot about ‘climate change,’ ‘global warming,’ but it doesn’t necessarily mean muscle shirts and tank tops in the middle of winter. It sometimes can mean, that polar vortex, it kind of gets all weakened, and then it spills. It spills southward, and so that’s why we end up with things like what you had this year.”

With highs in the single digits this week, and freezing temperatures overnight, Phillips said that should mean less chance for flooding, with a gradual melt of all that snow. Speaking of snow, we probably haven’t seen the last of it. Phillips said a quarter of our winter snowfall, roughly 26 cm, happens after the first day of spring.

But as for temperatures, the models for April, May, and into June suggest better news ahead.

“A lot of Canada is showing warmer than normal, from Saskatchewan to the Maritimes. What’s showing for Alberta is either above normal or normal,” Phillips said. “So, it’s coming, but it’s just taking its sweet time and people are getting a little testy.”

by Geoff Smith (@GeoffSmithLNN on Twitter)

Spring should warm up – eventually, says senior climatologist

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