Warmer weather on the way after southern Manitoba snow dump

March 7, 2024 Canuck

All weather warnings and alerts have ended as people in southern Manitoba plow their way through a fresh dump of snow — and Mother Nature is about to help with the clearing efforts.

Environment Canada meteorologist Shannon Moodie says the system that blew through the region on Wednesday was quick but left an impact.

Snowfall amounts ranged from six to 18 centimetres and came with strong winds that created drifting, icy conditions and poor visibility that shut down multiple highways, including the Trans-Canada.

The eastbound lanes of the Trans-Canada, between Brandon and the Saskatchewan border, finally reopened just before 8:30 a.m. after being closed for some 12 hours. The westbound lanes opened a short time after that.

Many other routes remained closed until nearly 9:30 a.m. Thursday. By then, Manitoba 511 showed only Highway 10 through Riding Mountain National Park was still blocked.

The conditions have also resulted in many schools cancelling classes or bus service for Thursday.

Environment Canada forecasts a warm-up in the weather by the weekend, which will help make some of the snow vanish.

Temperatures are expected to remain chilly Thursday and Friday before creeping closer to the normal high for this time of year, which is –3 C in Winnipeg, by Saturday.

Then, beginning Sunday and into next week, daytime highs are forecast to climb to anywhere from 2 C to 6 C.

In Winnipeg, the amount of snow varied through the neighbourhoods:

Airport: 8 cm.
St. James: 15 cm.
Island Lakes: 10 cm.
South St. Vital: 8 cm.
Old St Vital: 11 cm.

Snowfall also varied quite a bit outside Winnipeg:

Portage la Prairie: 20 cm.
Miami: 18 cm.
Brandon: 16 cm.
Morden: 12 cm.
Virden: 11 cm.
St-Pierre-Jolys: 9 cm
Morris: 7 cm.
Steinbach: 8 cm.

More than 200 plows and other equipment are working to clear major routes in Winnipeg.

Michael Cantor, Winnipeg’s manager of streets maintenance, said the goal is to get those routes and sidewalks done by Friday.

“It fell fast. We have been plowing overnight, plowed most of our regional streets and their sidewalks and will continue today and tonight to plow the rest of the city,” he said.

Crews have also begun tackling back lanes.

“[Those] will be done tomorrow night and we move into our residential sidewalks, which I expect to be done within 48 hours.”

School, bus cancellations

The storm and poor driving conditions have prompted the cancellation of classes at dozens of schools across southern Manitoba.

All schools in the following school divisions are closed for the day:

Beautiful Plains School Division.
Evergreen School Division.
Fort La Bosse School Division.
Lakeshore School Division.
Park West School Division.
Red River School Division.
Southwest Horizon School Division.
Sunrise School Division.

In Brandon School Division, Alexander, O’Kelly and Spring Valley schools are closed but other schools are open. School buses are not operating outside the city and attendance, where travel is required, is at parental discretion, a message from the division says.

Prairie Rose School Division has closed École St. Eustache, St. François Xavier Community School, St. Paul’s Collegiate and the Hutterian colony schools, but other community schools are open. Buses are not operating across the division.

In the Franco-Manitoban School Division, the following schools are closed: