Poor visibility in snow and blowing snow is expected across southern Manitoba on Friday, prompting school closures, travel warnings and notices about possible delays in health services.
A cold front is bringing strong northerly winds throughout the region but the conditions are expected to be particularly bad in the Red River Valley where Environment Canada has issued a blizzard warning.
Winds could gust as high as 90 km/h through the valley, giving extremely low visibility in the open countryside. It won’t likely be quite so poor in built-up urban areas such as Winnipeg, but highways such as the perimeter and Trans-Canada will be impacted, the weather agency says.
The blizzard conditions are also expected in the Interlake, east of the Manitoba Escarpment and on the Manitoba lakes.
The worst of the conditions should taper off later Friday afternoon or early evening.
A blowing snow advisory is in effect for all other areas in the southern half of the province that are outside of the blizzard warning. Travel is expected to be hazardous due to reduced visibility.
Conditions will improve in western Manitoba by Friday afternoon and in eastern Manitoba in the evening, Environment Canada says.
Meanwhile, Manitoba’s far north is under an extreme cold warning where bitterly cold air is flooding in from the Arctic. A prolonged period with wind chill values falling close to –50 is expected by late Friday afternoon and to continue through the weekend.
Almost two dozen highways have been closed by the province due to dangerous driving conditions.
That includes Highway 10 from Prospector to the Highway 60 junction, due to many stuck vehicles, according to a news release from the highways department.
School closures
Due to the severe conditions, the following school divisions have cancelled classes for Friday:
- Beautiful Plains.
- Fort La Bosse.
- Garden Valley.
- Lakeshore.
- Lord Selkirk.
- Prairie Rose.
- Prairie Spirit.
- Red River Valley.
- Rolling River.
- Southwest Horizon.
- Turtle Mountain.
The Seine River School Division issued a news release just after 8 a.m. to say it has closed schools for the day as well. However, some students had already been picked up by buses before the decision was made.
Those students will either be dropped off at their school or the nearest school, the division said in its release. Parents will be contacted to let them know where their kids are and how to pick them up.
The Franco-Manitoban School Division has closed the following schools:
- Aurèle-Lemoine (Saint-Laurent).
- Saint-Lazare.
- La Source (Shilo).
- Jours de Plaine (Laurier).
- Notre-Dame-de-Lourdes.
- Gilbert-Rosset.
Schools are open in the following Franco-Manitoban division schools, but buses are not operating:
- Gabrielle-Roy.
- Lagimodière (Lorette).
- Réal-Bérard (Saint-Pierre).
- Saint-Jean-Baptiste.
- Saint-Georges.
- Sainte-Agathe.
- Noël-Ritchot (only rural routes cancelled).
- Saint-Joachim (La Broquerie).
- Pointe-des-Chênes (Sainte-Anne).
The Brandon School Division is not operating any buses outside the city and has cancelled classes for Alexander, O’Kelly and Spring Valley schools. All other schools will be open and buses will be running within the city.
Attendance at school is at parental discretion where travel is required.
Mennonite Collegiate Institute in Gretna is holding remote learning on Friday so students won’t need to travel to the school.
Health services
The Winnipeg Regional Health Authority says community health services — home care services, in particular — may be affected due to the blizzard warning.
“Every effort will be made to maintain existing schedules. However, some weather-related delays or cancellations may be inevitable,” the authority said in a news release.
Clients whose visits will be postponed or cancelled can expect to be contacted by phone and notified of the change. Depending on the nature of the service, some visits could be delayed, rescheduled or cancelled.
Anyone wishing to cancel or postpone their own visits can contact their case coordinator or nurse. If after business hours, call 204-788-8331.
Temperature plunge
Along with the snow, temperatures across the south are also expected to fall throughout the day on Friday.
In Winnipeg, an early morning temperature of 2 C is forecasted to drop to –13 by the afternoon with a wind chill value around –30.
The daytime highs through the weekend and into early next week are forecast to be between –21 C and –26 C with overnight lows between –24 C and –30 C.
The normal for this time of year is a high of –13 C and low of –23 C.