TORONTO – Persistently warm winter temperatures from coast to coast dominated this year’s list of the top weather-related stories of the year from Environment Canada.
Environment Canada’s senior climatologist David Phillips says Canadians experienced warmer than average conditions right through the year, making the stretch from January to November the fourth-warmest on record since 1948.
Now it its 16th year, the annual list of the top ten weather stories from across Canada outlines the weather events that made headlines and broke records.
Global News takes a brief look back at the stories that captivated Canadians from coast to coast, based on factors such as the severity of the event, the impact it had, the extent of the area that was affected and the economic repercussions.
10) Historic ice-jam flooding in the Saint John River
Some 500 residents of Perth-Andover and Tobique First Nation were ordered to leave for higher ground in early March when flood waters along New Brunswick’s Saint John River spilled onto nearby fields and roads. With damage to several government buildings, the area hospital, two schools, a town hall and the fire station exceeding $25 million, officials declared a local state of emergency.
VIDEO: In this video below, the New Brunswick government begins relocating homes for some Perth-Andover residents out of the flood-zone (Nov. 21).
Perth-Andover has endured four major floods since the 1980s, the most recent in 2008. Water levels this time around reached at least a metre higher than in any previous flood, said officials. Homeowners and small businesses faced a messy and muddy cleanup, made worse by unseasonably cold temperatures that created another disaster-unheated buildings with frozen water pipes.
9) Hail to Calgary… again
On August 12, a hailstorm pelted parts of Calgary with golf-ball-sized hail. Within 10 minutes, residents had dents covering the sidings of houses and on vehicles. Backyard vegetable gardens were turned into coleslaw.
GALLERY: Hail storm in Calgary
Two days later, another powerful storm hit the area when temperatures at the airport dropped form 23 degrees Celsius to 11 degrees Celisus in one hour. Strong winds of 100 km/hr, rain and hail piled damage on Calgary and nearby Airdie. According to insurers, both storms resulted in about $400 million dollars in damages.
8) The year of the urban flood
This year saw many urban Canadian cities get hit by floods. On May 28, Thunder Bay, Ontario experienced record-breaking flooding while Montreal and Toronto found themselves in similar situations just a few days later.
VIDEO: Last night’s severe thunderstorm caused lightning strikes and flooding is many areas across the GTA. Marianne Dimain reports (July 26).
On May 29, a double-header rainstorm hit the Montreal area and caused the city’s sewer system to overflow, flooding streets and buildings. On July 15, short-lived afternoon thunderstorms left some basements in Toronto with sewage water to the ceiling. Scarborough received the worst of the storm with 88 mm of rain falling in a span of two hours.
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On July 25, a powerful summer storm moved over the city of Steinbach in Manitoba. Between 80 to 110 mm of rain fell. Parking lots and yards were turned into rivers and small lakes.
7) High and dry in the East
Higher than normal temperatures and a lack of rainfall in Eastern Canada meant a great summer for most outdoor enthusiasts, but trouble for some crops and water systems.
The lack of rain in 2012 was a reversal from the previous year when the area was doused with precipitation.
Atlantic Canada had its driest and fourth-warmest spring on record while southern Ontario and Quebec had the mildest temperatures ever recorded from winter to spring. When it did rain, Phillips said it was either “too much too fast or too short and too little.”
6) The Big Melt
The year 2012 will go down as one of extraordinary change across the Arctic Ocean, with sea ice that is becoming dramatically thinner and weaker.
VIDEO: As polar ice melts at record rates, should we profit from it – or protect against it? Eric Sorensen reports. (Dec. 5)
Summer in the Prairies started out with short-lived cool temperatures and ended as one of the ten warmest on record. It followed a spring that was the third wettest and fifth warmest in 65 years of record-keeping.
In summer 2012, there were 371 severe events across the Prairies. Alberta recorded its greatest number at 169 and Saskatchewan its second highest total ever with 135. While fewer tornadoes than normal occurred in both Alberta and Manitoba, Saskatchewan reported its highest number of tornadoes ever-with 33 touchdowns as opposed to the normal 13.
FEATURE: Ontario applies to feds for disaster funding to ease effects of drought
4) March’s meteorological mildness
The March 2012 heat wave was off the scale in every way: intense, broad and long-lasting. The heat eclipsed every previous temperature record and upstaged the winter that wasn’t.
Around mid-March and early spring, temperatures across central and eastern Canada soared and record-breaking temperatures dominated two-thirds of North America.
- 4 tornadoes landed in the Prairies during Sunday’s storm, researchers confirm
- Environment Canada says Atlantic Canadians could be in for a wet long weekend
- Toronto begins recovery after ‘100-year storm’ leaves behind massive flooding
- ‘We have to move quickly’: Canadians lend a hand as massive relief effort in Nepal begins
VIDEO: While some Canadians are enjoying the sun and spring-like weather, Newfoundlanders received a reminder that winter is still around. Ross Lord reports.(March. 7)
According to Environment Canada, in Winnipeg, temperatures soared to 20.8 degrees Celsius on March 19, the earliest date ever that the temperature rose above 20 degrees Celsius in a calendar year. The next day, the temperature topped 23.7 degrees. On March 20, Lake Major, Nova Scotia recorded a noteworthy 30 degrees Celsius.
3) B.C. flooding: Larger, longer and lethal
High levels of early spring flooding in British Columbia caused washouts, landslides, evacuations and fatalities in 2012.
In June, hundreds of residents were evacuated and others were without clean drinking water after a weekend of heavy rain flooded homes and washed away roads in several areas of the province.
Weeks of rapid snowmelt and wet weather caused river levels to rise in the B.C. Interior, the Kootenay region and the Fraser Valley, while heavy rain and violent thunderstorms pushed many rivers and creeks in those areas to the brink.
Hardest hit was Sicamous, a community of about 3,100 people north of Kelowna, where about 350 people were ordered to leave their homes due to flooding along the Sicamous and Hummingbird creeks.
2) Super Storm Sandy and another active hurricane season
Forecasters were right on the money when they accurately predicted another active Atlantic hurricane season in 2012. At season’s end, there were 19 named storms from Alberto to Tony, 10 of which became full-blown hurricanes.
Some of the most notable storms were Hurricane Leslie and Hurricane Sandy. Leslie soaked parts of the province of Nova Scotia, leading to tide-enhancing floods and evacuations of families along the Salmon and North rivers near Truro.
On October 20, Hurricane Sandy morphed into a post-tropical storm and was felt throughout southern Ontario and Quebec and the Maritimes in terms of freezing rain, heavy winds and some flooding.
According to Property Claim Services Canada, insurance losses from Sandy in Canada exceeded $100 million.
VIDEO: Learning from Superstorm Sandy, communities along Canada’s East Coast are taking drastic measures in the hopes of avoiding devastation from severe storms. Ross Lord explains.
1) The Big Heat
Canadians experienced above-normal temperatures and several record-breaking days through winter, spring and summer from coast to coast to coast.
According to Environment Canada, in the last ten years, there have only been four out of 40 seasons that were colder than normal, and in 2012 alone, winter, spring and summer were among the top 10 hottest for their respective seasons.
Canucks saw more green than white, more rain than snow, and felt more mild temperatures than cold. Between December 2011 and February 2012, Environment Canada says temperatures were about 3.6 degrees Celsius above normal.
The World Meteorological Organization reported that 2012 will likely be in the top ten of the hottest years in more than 160 years.
– with a file from The Canadian Press
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