Massive storm cuts a swath of destruction

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 31/07/2012 (5005 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Manitobans should count their blessings after Sunday night’s storm, despite reports of property damage rolling in from across the province.

“The fact that nobody was killed was a miracle,” Ronald Stewart, an atmospheric physicist at the University of Manitoba, said Monday.

Roofs were blown off cottages near Lake Manitoba, a tornado was spotted near Lac du Bonnet, wind derailed 12 rail cars near Marquette and a child was reportedly lifted more than half a metre off the ground by winds that measured 89 kilometres per hour at Richardson International Airport in Winnipeg.

Stewart, the head of the U of M’s faculty of environment and geography, who’s working on two major climate studies, said the signs for a massive storm had lined up by 6:30 a.m. Sunday.

“Before the storm, it was extraordinarily hot and humid… You just knew during the day something was going to happen. It was like a blast furnace outside,” Stewart said. “It was all set up.”

He watched the storm from a safe spot inside his home. “It was an incredibly violent system,” Stewart said.

Sunday’s storm was really two storms that met at the right place at the wrong time. They layered on top of each other, built a wall of wind and a band of thunderstorms.

The source was a low-pressure system and an upper-air disturbance, said Natalie Hasell, a Manitoba-based meteorologist from Environment Canada.

The wall of wind packed the force of a hurricane, carrying hail, torrential rain and gale-force gusts.

Sunday’s storm was marked by a long series of intense thunderstorms and straight-line winds. It packed the force of a tornado, but it had the long and wide reach of a hurricane.

The storm tracked in from Saskatchewan just as dawn broke; Environment Canada issued the first of several weather watches and warnings at 5:21 a.m.

“This thing started in Swan River. It moved into the Interlake and then it made a beeline for the southeast part of the province,” Hasell said.

The last weather watch in Winnipeg ended late Sunday night.

“What we saw was an active straight-line wind phenomenon,” Hasell added.

“I’ve seen a number of news reports that decided there were tornadoes and we’re not saying it wasn’t a tornado but we don’t have any evidence of that.

“Straight-line winds can cause the kind of damage we’ve seen,” Hasell said.

For Stewart, Sunday’s storm is a harbinger. There will be more to come, he predicts.

“I can see that, the new normal,” Stewart said. “One doesn’t want to couch everything in climate change, but when you have a warmer world, you’re going to have huge dryness and huge wetness. We have one of the most extreme climates in the whole world. It could become even more so. I don’t think this storm set a precedent. I do think it is indicative of the variable climate that we have.”

alexandra.paul@freepress.mb.ca

Getting the city back to normal

CITY of Winnipeg crews worked to clear away debris and dozens of trees in the aftermath of Sunday’s storm.

A full complement of city crews were out on Winnipeg streets to deal with the cleanup Monday, and it was “all hands on deck,” attending to phone calls, city spokeswoman Tammy Melesko said in an email statement. She said city park staff is working with the forestry branch to clean up park areas and conduct sweeps through the streets to pick up debris.

Most of the 500 calls the city received through the 311 line about the storm were regarding fallen trees, including “hazardous” trees blocking roads or on hydro lines.

As of Monday afternoon, there were 169 reports of hazardous fallen trees, 222 reports of trees that split and could be dangerous, 52 reports of fallen trees and 144 calls for brush pickup.

Crews will deal with the worst first and work with Manitoba Hydro to ensure staff are safe during the cleanup, Melesko said.

Fort Garry was one of the hardest-hit areas of the city, and crews are expected to work on storm-recovery efforts over the next few weeks.

Large trees that pose the biggest threat are being dealt with first. The city has also received calls about traffic signal outages.