Welcome to the first full day of Spring!

We have some classic spring weather on the way for this week. It’s going to be cool… rainy… and blustery.

You’re going to want to pack sunglasses, a sweater, a tshirt, and an umbrella. :)

In the next few days I’ll post a roundup of the Winter months. But I think it’s safe to say that if there was one word you could use to describe the winter of 2009/2010 it would be. Warm.

OK, not quite summer. But by the end of this week we should see some very pleasant temperatures and pleasant skys.

They’re still telling us we’re going to get some wind this morning, we certainly haven’t seen anything yet.

So far Friday looks like the nicest day. Current forecast is for a balmy 14 degrees! If you haven’t cut your grass yet this year, you’re probably regretting it! :D Well, by Saturday it should be dried out enough to cut.

I’m going to go dig up some long range forecasts. I think by the end of this weekend we might be wondering just what May Long Weekend might hold in store. :)

So I wake up this morning at 5:30 to get ready for work, I glance out my front window and there is a bunch of white stuff all over the place!

What!?

Here they were calling for 10-20mm of rain overnight last night and instead we get a dump of wet and nasty slush all over the place. Probably about 3cm worth in spots here at Alberniweather.

Be careful driving on Highway 4 today. I just went to drivebc and they are reporting Compact Snow with Slippery sections all the way from Tofino/Ucluelet Junction to Qualicum junction.

This should be the last we see of the white stuff. And later today we should also get a good blast of wind everywhere but in Port Alberni. On my drive home Wed. Afternoon Mr. Madryga said there was a gust of wind at Sartina Island off Cape Scott of 145kph. That’s Cat 2 hurricane strength! Yeeha.

Have fun in the snow all. Stay warm. We should warm up to more seasonal temperatures by Sunday.

No snow for here, but maybe some snow for where it counts for those poor skiers plying their trade on hay bales and fake stuff.

Todays rain will be steady, but not overly drenching. It is also at least a little on the cool side, so hopefully that means snow for the mountains and no worry about flooding or anything like that.

The worst of the rain will come on Saturday night and it will warm up a bit as well for Saturday so it is likely to rain fairly high up as well.

Either way, it’s a pretty typical winter welcome for the Olympics. Lets face it, this is Vancouver after all, did we really expect it to snow?

Meanwhile, on the other side of the Rockies, the world is basically coming to an end. It’s snowing in Dallas, and the reallyreally* White House is buried under >120 centimeters of snow. That’s over 4 feet!

P.S. You will have noticed the change in style on the webpage. Not a huge change, but I think it’s cool. I’ve been honing my web coding skills and learning some new stuff.

Also, for any Internet Explorer users, I realised the menus on the side haven’t been working properly for you for quite a while. My apologies. You should now be able to use those menus a little more easily.

And finally. If you click on the Alberniweather Webcam image inside the current conditions, you will now come to a “live” feed of the webcam rather just a large static image. The image now updates automatically every 5 seconds or so.

And don’t forget about the Video Timelapses on Youtube and Wunderground. I uploaded a full year timelapse of 2009 a few weeks ago. You can see it at http://www.youtube.com/alberniweather

Come on, admit it. You’re secretly wishing for it aren’t you ;)
Welcome to Vancouver, Need an Umbrella? :D

UPDATE: This is getting a little more serious now. As of this morning (Monday) the GFS has increased its estimate up to 210mm Thursday through Sunday. With the largest amounts coming Friday night and Sunday morning. The probability of strong winds has also increased particularly for all of Saturday but also on Thursday night . Saturday is still 6 days away, so this forecast could still change but at this point it is pretty ugly.

On the bright side, the temperatures aren’t forecast to be above 8 degrees. So maybe, juuuuuust maybe, Cypress Bowl will get a big dump of snow right in time for the Olympics.

Or maybe they’ll still have to snowboard on the straw bales and 2 month old snow, while it pukes down sleet.

Oh I don’t envy those athletes nor the organizers one bit. They’re really not getting much of a break!

We’ll see how it pans out.

Full Disclosure: My wife, daughter and I will be at the Opening Ceremonies on Friday (nosebleeds! 5 from the top of BC Place!) and Canada vs. Slovakia womens hockey on Saturday. We’re extremely excited and I really hope the weather is OK. We’re also very thankful to my friends in Vancouver who have put us up (or are putting up with us? :) ) for 3 nights! Thanks Rod and Roz, you’re the best!!