Sunday, January 05, 2014

Freezing Rain Warning for Montreal

The intense cold that gripped Montreal to start 2014 will ease a little today and early Monday. The trade off is that at least 25mm of precipitation in the form of snow, ice and rain are forecast. (Photo by John Kenney - Montreal Gazette)
FREEZING RAIN WARNING
Strong low pressure will lift northeast today from the mid Mississippi Valley into the Great Lakes and eventually down the St. Lawrence Valley. The storm will deepen while doing so providing most of Ontario and Quebec with a decent storm. Cold air in place today will eventually be pushed out by a surge of warm air from the south. This will allow freezing rain to develop along a wide area of the 401/Montreal to Toronto corridor this afternoon and tonight. Northwest of Ottawa it will be mainly snow with as much as 20cm (8 inches) forecast.

Freezing rain warnings are in effect for a wide area from Ontario into Quebec, portions of Atlantic Canada and northern NY and Vermont. The precipitation has started as snow this morning with as much as 5-10cm possible before the changeover tonight. Up to 15mm of freezing rain is possible in Montreal with less to the southwest in Ontario. Winds will be another factor with this storm increasing to 30-50km/h today and as high as 90km/h on Monday as the storm nears Montreal. Once the system passes to the northeast a strong cold front will sweep through Montreal dropping temperatures rapidly with a quick freeze and a return to dangerous cold late Monday and until Wednesday.

Temperatures currently are -9C (16F) here on L'Ile Perrot, they will rise to as warm as plus 4C (40F) in some parts of the metro region by Monday morning before dropping rapidly to -5C (23F) by Monday afternoon and eventually settle into the -20C (-4F) range by Tuesday morning. This will be a very dramatic temperature swing with lots of ice around so be extra careful Monday.

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