What’s the old saying: in like a lion, out like a lamb? Don’t you just love April? In most of our minds, once April rolls around it is supposed to turn nice and warm and our thoughts turn to planting. What we tend to forget is that April — especially the first two weeks of
Weather outlook points to a cool, wet spring
Manitoba’s March 2020 was warmer than average, albeit not by much
Forecast: More sun than clouds, but cool
Covering the period from April 8 to April 15
If you recall last week’s forecast, I didn’t have a lot of confidence in the weather models, but as it turned out, they did a fairly good job. The one thing they missed out on was the intensity of the snow with the storm system that brought a widespread 10 to 20 cm of snow
Weather school: Conduction, convection and latent heat
It takes lots of heat to evaporate water, so it releases lots of heat when it condenses
This is one of those months where the end of the month and my deadline just don’t match up. With the volatile temperatures we’ve seen during March, I just couldn’t try to do a monthly weather roundup with five days still left in the month. So, the weather roundup and the look ahead will have
Forecast: Winter doesn’t want to leave
Covering the period from April 1 to April 8
If I’ve said it once, I have said it at least a hundred times: Forecasting the weather at this time of the year is hard. If you have been following the weather models over the last couple of weeks you would know what I mean. One day they forecast a big warm-up and next a
Weather school: Reflecting on albedo
Longer-range spring weather forecasts aren’t all in lockstep just yet
With COVID-19 forcing students to take a break from going to school, it doesn’t mean that they’re not supposed to still do schoolwork — so while I’m prepping online material for my students, I think it’s only fair we continue with my online weather course. This issue we’re going to continue our look at the
Forecast: Spring weather slow to move in
Covering the period from March 25 to April 1
Well, my last forecast was not too bad — a little optimistic on temperatures, maybe, but the overall pattern was handled pretty well by the weather models. The main reason is that we seem to be stuck in this particular weather pattern, so until something big comes along to change it, expect more of the
Weather school: Why is the sky blue?
Insolation is the driving force behind all our weather
After taking a bit of a break from Weather School, it’s time to get right back at it. With all the craziness going on in the world, hopefully a little bit of learning from the comfort of home or the office is just what you need. Plus, with really mild spring weather still a couple
Forecast: Colder-than-average temperatures expected
Covering the period from March 18 to March 25
For those of you who regularly read my forecasts, you will know I hate to write forecasts in the spring and fall — but especially in the spring. The yearly fight between cold and warm air in the spring often makes it difficult to accurately predict the weather beyond about five days. Since I write
Weather school: Breaking down the atmosphere
If you fly up to about 5,000 m, nearly half the atmosphere’s mass is below you
After taking a week off from Weather School to take our monthly look back at the previous month’s weather, and to peer ahead to see what type of weather we may see over the next couple of months, it’s time to finish up our discussion about the seasons. We need to take a look at
Forecast: One final shot of arctic air ahead?
Covering the period from March 11 to March 18
As expected, we did see an active storm track during the last forecast period, and as often happens, the weather models struggled. The biggest issue the weather models seem to have is with the intensity of the cold air. The models keep trying to drop in some fairly cold air, but so far, we have