Wicked cold Sunday in Montreal

Montreal Mayor Denis Coderre braved the cold along with thousands of others on Sunday for the 192nd Annual Montreal St. Patrick's Day Parade. (United Irish Society of Montreal Photo)

Despite the fact the calendar says spring, the season has yet to arrive. Sunday was another of oh so many cold days in Montreal these last few months. The temperature struggled to make it to -10C (14F), a full 15 degrees below the normal high for the date. If that was not enough, cold northwest winds over 50km/h put a dangerous windchill in the air. It was not enough to stop thousands from participating and watching the 192nd Annual Montreal St. Patrick's Day Parade. They bundled up and endured near record cold. The low Sunday morning was -16C (3F), just shy of the record of -16.7 (2F) set in 1959. This morning we are no better off, again at -16C (3F), and once again just shy of the record low of -17.2C (1F) set in 1997. Today will be windy and cold again with a high of -6C (21F). There is some good news, this arctic high pressure will drift east and allow a warm front to move into southern Quebec and Ontario by Wednesday. The result will be a high of 0C (32F) on Tuesday, and all the way up to 7C (45F) by Wednesday. Sunshine today and Tuesday followed by thickening clouds Wednesday with the chance of light rain by the afternoon.

We also managed snow over the weekend in Montreal with around 5cm on Saturday. Eastern Quebec had the brunt of the latest storm as it has most of the season. Up to 20cm fell across the Gaspe and Lower North Shore with strong winds and blowing snow. With only one full week left in March, the snow pack is very deep across the eastern third of the country. While Montreal has between 5 and 10cm of snow on the ground officially at Trudeau Airport, more in the suburbs, Halifax has 92cm and Charlottetown, PEI a whopping 146cm. We may have snow around until the end of April this year!