Weather Archives - CMOS BULLETIN SCMO

A Note on ECCC Radar Snowfall Estimates and Radar Data

Written on July 28, 2020.

Diar Hassan (Wood PLC, Ottawa ON), George Isaac (Weather Impacts Consulting Inc., Barrie ON), Peter Taylor (York University, Toronto ON), Daniel Michelson (Environment and Climate Change Canada – ECCC), and Norman Donaldson (ECCC).

It often snows in Newfoundland but on 17 January 2020, it was a little extreme (Figure 1). METAR reports from St John’s airport, CYYT, indicated 35 cm of snow fell between 1200-1800 UTC and another 19 cm in the next 6 hours. These snowfall depth measurements are consistent with many others in the area.

Micrometeorological Variables and Atmospheric Dispersion Modeling in Two Climate Regions of Quebec

Written on July 27, 2020.

– By Richard Leduc, Ph.D., AirMet Science Inc., and Jean-François Brière, Ministère de l’Environnement et de la Lutte contre les changements climatiques

The US-EPA (2019a) AERMOD dispersion model is widely used to assess the concentration of contaminants in ambient air as a result of emissions from a source. To this end, AERMOD requires micrometeorological variables characterizing turbulence (u*, w*, L, zic, zim); they are calculated by the AERMET module and obtained using local surface and upper air data (wind, temperature and cloud opacity),

Webinar on IFMS and its Value Proposition

Written on July 14, 2020.

The International Forum of Meteorological Societies is holding a Webinar on “IFMS and its Value Proposition: achievements, plans and challenges”. Since IFMS is a conglomeration of Meteorological Societies which are one of the major keys players in the development of the Global Weather Enterprise, it would be interesting for you to see how IFMS is helping these societies to become stronger.

2020 Arctic Summer Seasonal Climate Outlook for Sea-Ice

Written on July 5, 2020.

– By contributors from Environment and Climate Change Canada, the University of Québec at Montréal, the Arctic and Antarctic Research Institute, the Hydrometeorological Centre of Russia, The Norwegian Meteorological Institute, Finnish Meteorological Institute, World Meteorological Organization, Climate Prediction Center, and National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration –

Arctic Climate Forum Consensus Statement (Continued)

Highlights

Warmer than normal surface air temperatures over Eurasia and the Arctic Ocean contributed to below to near normal ice conditions during the 2019-2020 winter across the entire Arctic.

2020 Arctic Summer Seasonal Climate Outlook for Temperature and Precipitation

Written on June 30, 2020.

– By contributors from Environment and Climate Change Canada, the Arctic and Antarctic Research Institute, the Hydrometeorological Centre of Russia, The Norwegian Meteorological Institute, Finnish Meteorological Institute, World Meteorological Organization, Climate Prediction Center, and National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration –

Arctic Climate Forum Consensus Statement

And Summary of the 2020 Arctic Winter Season

CONTEXT

Arctic temperatures continue to warm at more than twice the global mean. Annual surface air temperatures over the last 4 years (2016–2019) in the Arctic (60°–85°N) have been the highest in the time series of observations for 1936-2019.

Ontario’s Coldest Temperature Re-Visited: Setting the Record Straight

Written on June 25, 2020.

– By Bryan Smith –

How accurate are Canada’s weather records? The case of Ontario’s all-time record low temperature casts some doubt.

Canadians have free access to one of the most extensive climate databases in the world with data going back to 1840. However, despite efforts to quality-assure this data, suspicious values emerge from time to time among the millions of archived observations. The reasons for the occurrence of inaccurate data are numerous,

Visibility Forecast in Wildfire Smoke: An August 2018 Case Study

Written on April 27, 2020.

– By Yimei Li, Canadian Meteorological Aviation Centre, Environment and Climate Change Canada –

In recent years, wildfire smoke has become an increasingly alarming natural disaster in Western Canada. In 2017 and 2018, the British Columbia provincial government declared a state of emergency for two consecutive summers in response to the wildfire situation (1). These were the third and fourth declarations in history and the previous ones were in 1996 and 2003.

Blue Sky Blues or the Three Degrees of Aircraft Pollution

Written on April 10, 2020.

– By Phil Chadwick –

The title of this 2012 painting below, numbered 1260 in my artistic journey, is “Three Degrees”. That title might sound cryptic. Let me explain.

All air traffic was grounded over North America for three or four days after the terror attacks of 9/11 on September 11th, 2001. A couple of curious meteorologists investigated the impact of grounding those aircraft. They discovered that the skies were much clearer and that temperatures responded correspondingly.

Seasonal Outlook for the spring 2020 (MAM) based on the official CanSIPS forecast issued on the 28th Feb. 2020

Written on March 22, 2020.

– By M. Markovic, B. Merryfield, M. Alarie, Environment and Climate Change Canada –

Seasonal Outlook for Spring 2020 (March, April, May) in Canada is for elevated temperatures in eastern Canada and below normal temperatures in the west, with equal chances for precipitation for most of the country.