Weather In The 'PegI’ve been doing some work on identification, examination, and forecasting of #BlowingSnow recently; as a result, my eye’s a bit attuned to it now. That said, some parameters I’ve been looking at recently to forecast blowing snow seem to be working well and capturing events that traditional methods have missed in the past. Today’s example: a large plume of blowing snow in southern #SKstorm. Regina’s visibility is 4-5 miles in BLSN, Moose Jaw is 3 SM, and Estevan is 1.75 SM.
Winds are generally 30–40 km/h, with some gusts of 50–60 in there, which would be marginal concern most of the time. Based on my ideas, if they hold any water and models are correct, we should see some improvement in the Moose Jaw area sometime in the 22Z–00Z range, while it could linger to later this evening in the Qu’Applle Valley to the east. The worst of the blowing snow is actually between all these sites, though, with a large plume running NW-SE between Weyburn and Regina.
It’s not a terrible event by any measure; likely essentially zero impact to transportation except possibly needing to slow down a bit in the midst of the thickest part of the plume. But it’s more the fact it exists today at all, and looking into the mechanisms driving it, because it’s a lot more complicated than just being a semi-windy day. 😅