Storm Brings A Buffet Of Miserable Weather

Back on Tuesday, Environment Canada put out the first alert about a significant storm for this weekend.

Well, forecasters nailed it.

The region received buckets of rain until late yesterday afternoon, followed by freezing rain, ice pellets and snow Saturday evening until early this morning.

The worst of the ice accretion has been in higher elevation communities such as Caledon, Shelburne and Mount Forest, and where Hydro One is dealing with the most power outages.

Many scenes like this around The Shelburne area this morning. #ONStorm pic.twitter.com/me2A3iMdlN

— Chief Lemaich SDFD (@bradlemaich) January 12, 2020

In our area, there was localized flooding in parts of Barrie, but the worst of the worst was in the community of Belle Ewart in Innisfi.

Operation Teams working hard, the pumps are too, pumping water out of the affected areas. This is Maple and Belle Aire Beach Rd. A reminder to avoid flooded areas and roadways. Thank you for your patience. pic.twitter.com/cj7SqmZqzk

— Town of Innisfil (@townofinnisfil) January 11, 2020

Town crews spent most of Saturday pumping water from affected areas. Flooding also cut electricity to more than 1,400 InnPower customers, which was restored last night.

Due to the extreme weather, Mount St. Louis Moonstone and Snow Valley are closed today, while start up could be delayed at Blue Mountain.

Weather conditions will gradually improve as the morning moves along.

Salters and sanders have been out all night trying to keep up with the storm. Either way, motorists will need to use extreme caution because of the icy conditions. A blanket of snow on some roads is just hiding the ice underneath.

One blessing in all of this is that it’s Sunday, so traffic volume is much lighter.

By the numbers from Environment Canada:

A moisture laden low from Texas continues to impact a large portion 
of Ontario. Many alerts remain in effect, please refer to 
weather.gc.ca/warnings/ for the latest. 

From heavy rain and record temperatures for Southwestern Ontario and 
the Golden Horseshoe to an ice storm for the Dundalk Highlands to 
heavy snow and whiteouts for parts of Northeastern Ontario, this 
storm has been far reaching and impactful. 

The following is a summary of reports received by the Ontario Storm 
Prediction Centre as of 2.00 AM Sunday, January 12. 

1. Summary of new record high temperatures for Saturday, January 11 
in degrees Celsius: 

Toronto Pearson Airport 
New record 11.9 
Old record 11.7 (set in 1975) 

London Airport 
New record 11.7 
Old record 11.1 (1975) 

Toronto Buttonville Airport 
New record 11.3 
Old record 7.4 (2008) 

Oshawa Airport 
New record 11.3 
Old record 10.0 (1975) 

Waterloo-Wellington 
New record 11.6 
Old record 11.5 (2018) 

Sarnia Airport 
New record 11.8 
Old record 11.7 (2018) 

Welland-Pelham 
New record 14.5 
Old record 14.0 (2018) 

Burlington Pier 
New record 13.6 
Old record 12.9 (2018) 

Delhi 
New record 13.9 
Old record 11.2 (2017) 

Peterborough Airport 
New record 12.0 
Old record 11.0 (1975) 

Cobourg 
New record 10.8 
Old record 10.0 (2018) 

2. Summary of total rainfall amounts as of 2.00 AM Sunday, January 
12 in millimetres: 

University of Waterloo 81.8 
King City 75.0 
Guelph 65.2 
London 64.2 
Sarnia 63.0 
Windsor 60.9 
Toronto Billy Bishop Airport 60.4 
Trenton 60.2 
Toronto Pearson Airport 59.0 
Oshawa 57.3 
Peterborough Trent University 56.1 
Toronto City 55.3 
Peterborough Airport 53.4 
Point Pelee 52.6 
Goderich 52.2 
Moose Creek Wells 49.6 
Waterloo Airport 48.3 
Delhi 45.4 
Harrow 43.8 
Bancroft 42.4 
Muskoka 39.0 
Kingston 38.1 
Ridgetown 37.9 
Ottawa Airport 34.1 
Beatrice 25.6