Those who had to slog through it to get to work would argue the point, but it turns out a winter storm that hit the North Slave did not have the fury to be properly called a blizzard.
Northern News Services
Yellowknife (Mar 21/01) - Wind and snowfall started increasing early Monday morning, and by the time the city awoke the snow was flying in winds of 30-40 kilometres per hour with thermometers showing -24 C.
The result of a surface high pressure ridge that, as of yesterday, was still sitting over the Mackenzie Valley, the storm hit Lac de Gras and the Dogrib communities on its way to Yellowknife.
The winter resupply road leading to the Ekati and Diavik diamond mines was closed Sunday night at 8 p.m., said Echo Bay logistics manager Kirk McLellan.
Plowing crews were still working to open the road yesterday at deadline. Highway 3 and the Ingraham Trail remained open through the storm.
"We're still going to be OK unless something dramatic happens in terms of weather," said McLellan of the remainder of the season.
McLellan said 5,500 of a projected total of 7,400 truckloads had been shipped up the road so far this winter. Typically, the road remains open until early April. As many as 180-190 trucks can move up the road in a day. Though it disrupted traffic in the region, the storm did not measure up to Environment Canada's definition of a blizzard.
"With regard to those conditions, Yellowknife has not had a blizzard in the last 20 years," said Craig MacLaren of the Environment Canada Arctic Weather Centre. MacLaren said the conditions Monday would have been a blizzard if they occurred out on a lake or above the tree line.
At Ekati on Monday, for example, visibility was down to less than half a kilometre and winds were blowing at a steady 52 kilometres per hour. "Once you get north of that treeline, everything can drop really quick," said MacLaren.
First Air's Yellowknife base manager Norm Case agreed. He said the storm caused some minor delays but no flights were cancelled.
"In terms of blizzards it was a little baby. At our stations in Iqaluit, Rankin and Cambridge Bay, this would be normal weather."
The storm did keep city works crews busy keeping main roads from being blown in.
"We had to be out there working, basically 24 hours a day," said city public works director Gary Craig.
So, will this be the last storm of the year?
"I think we're still a little early to say that," said MacLaren. "Chance are you'll get another storm coming in before the end of winter."
