Darrell Greer
Northern News Services

RANKIN INLET (July 21/99) - A new weather-information system has been announced for the Kivalliq Region which will take much of the guesswork out of upcoming weather conditions for its residents, especially those who venture out onto the land during the winter.

Jim Cameron of the Department of Community Government, Housing and Transportation, says the 24-hour local weather hotline came to be as a result of a survey conducted by Yvonne Bilan-Wallace in May of this year.

Cameron says Bilan-Wallace was conducting public relations work on weather forecasting in Rankin Inlet. She met with elders and youth to discuss the availability of weather forecasting to the average person and discovered there wasn't much available beyond those with Internet access.

"She suggested use of the automated telephone announcing device (ATAD), which had been used with success in the south and would work well up here," says Cameron.

"The ATAD box is located in the emergency measures office of the regional Department of Community Government, Housing and Transportation office in Rankin."

Environment Canada employees call in from the Environment Canada Arctic Weather Centre in Edmonton and load the latest weather conditions into the box. To utilize the new device, people need only call 645-3739 and they will hear the current weather conditions, any severe weather warning which may be listed and both the public and marine forecasts.

An Inuktitut version is available to local callers from Monday to Friday, 8:30 a.m. until 5 p.m., while English is available 24 hours a day, seven days a week.

"Lots of people don't have the Internet, but they still need to get reliable weather information," says Cameron. "This system will help hunters with their planning and, hopefully, it will help prevent future tragedies and cut down the number of search and rescue operations we need to conduct.

"We actually didn't know this service was available until Bilan-Wallace told us during her visit. Environment Canada employees actually phone in every hour and manually load the information into this box, so that department does a fair share of the work.

"Eventually, which we hope will be in the not-too-distant future, we will be able to provide a 1-800 service so that it becomes a truly regional service."