IQALUIT
Summer in Iqaluit this year has been one of rain, clouds, fog, lasting sea ice and cold temperatures.

Gloomy skies and rain have been a staple of summer in Iqaluit so far. Colder than usual temperatures have slowed cargo deliveries, interfered with flights and impacted seal hunts. - Stewart Burnett/NNSL photo

"It has really been downright miserable," said David Phillips, senior climatologist with Environment Canada.

Last week, the territory's capital finally entered the double-digit temperature mark for the first time this summer, which has been unusually cool and averaging five or six degrees compared to the usual 12 C at this time of year.

While Western Canada has been experiencing a heat wave and Atlantic Canada has been very wet, Iqaluit has seen a "double whammy" of cold and wetness, said Phillips.

But it's not even true all over the territory -- the west has been warmer and drier, and even northern Baffin Island has had less rain than the southern end.

"In some parts of the Arctic it's been bone dry, like in the Western Arctic, but in the Eastern Arctic it's been anything but that," said Phillips. "It's not so miserable elsewhere in Nunavut. Iqaluit seems to have kind of a black cloud hanging over you people there."

For a stretch between June and July, 21 of 23 days had rain, Phillips said.

"It's almost like Vancouver weather in the wintertime that you're getting in the summertime," he said. "You just can't get a break. A lot of overcast, and when it isn't raining it's looking like rain."

The first 11 days of July had rain and Phillips sees more in the future.

"I wish I could give you some hope," he said, looking at forecasts for the next month showing little change in the trend.

"You know that summer is fleeting. You're moving along and you're not having any kind of great outdoor weather. You've got lots of daylight and you can't even enjoy it because the surface weather is so miserable. I wish I could give you some good news. I don't see it."

Southern Baffin Island has been a magnet for cold and rainy weather systems, he said.

Adding to the cool temperatures is the fact air coming up from the south is getting refrigerated on the colder-than-usual northern Atlantic Ocean, drawing clouds with it and keeping the sun off the water and preventing it from heating up. That cold rain is why the sea ice has been slow to melt this year in Frobisher Bay, too.

Whenever strange weather comes up, so does climate change, but Phillips doesn't think that's a relevant issue in this case.

"Journalists, the public, every time there is some wackiness with the weather, people always want to go to the climate change card," said Phillips.

"I'm always very careful in going there. Climate change is something that would happen over decades or longer. I'd be reluctant to put it down as climate change."

It's just been bad luck, he said.

We welcome your opinions. Click here to e-mail a letter to the editor.