Interlake areas pelted with large hail

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This article was published 03/07/2023 (882 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Thunderstorms brought ping-pong ball-sized hail to some parts of the Interlake over the weekend. The storms arrived in Manitoba as part of the same weather system that produced a destructive tornado Saturday in central Alberta.

“We didn’t have any reports of any tornadoes, and just based on what we saw on the radar, it would appear that they were straight-line winds,” Terri Lang, a meteorologist with Environment and Climate Change Canada, said Monday.

Ping-pong to golf ball-sized hail was reported in Childs Lake, Duck Mountain, Winnipegosis, Rathwell and Hodgson.

“That’ll do some damage, especially if it’s being driven by winds. That will rip the siding off of buildings, that will dent cars, that will break windows,” Lang said.

Lang said most of the high winds reported over the weekend were straight-line, or plow, winds that gusted out from the front of the thunderstorms.

Closer to Winnipeg, large hail hit Niverville, and residents in some places closer to the capital city reported pea-, dime- or loonie-sized hail, Lang said.

Storms damaged trees and power lines, leaving roughly 1,900 Interlake residents without power into Monday afternoon, according to a Twitter post from Manitoba Hydro.

Hydro stated it couldn’t provide estimated restoration times. An outage map on its website hadn’t been updated by Monday afternoon, with the Crown corporation pointing to the ongoing labour disruption.

Some workers began job action June 30, after unresolved negotiations between the utility and International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers Local 2034.

On Friday, Hydro stated it had contingency plans in place for the job action, but it also cautioned Manitobans to expect delays in restoring power following an outage. A Hydro representative couldn’t be reached for comment on the labour disruption Monday.

In late June, the Northern Tornadoes Project at Ontario’s Western University confirmed three tornadoes hit Manitoba in quick succession, on the heels of a severe thunderstorm just after 9:30 p.m. June 20. The tornadoes hit areas in and around William Lake Provincial Park, north of Killarney, and northwest of Bagot.

All three were determined to be EF1 tornadoes. The enhanced Fujita scale rates such events on intensity from EF0 (105-137 km/h winds) to EF5 (winds in excess of 323 km/hr).

The risk of severe weather has declined now that high temperatures and humidity have dropped, Lang said, adding no storms are forecast in Manitoba within the next few days.

“The atmosphere is certainly stabilizing, so we’re not looking at any more big thunderstorms… at least for the next number of days.”

katie.may@winnipegfreepress.com