Category: Storms

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Deep Freeze: Book about Winter 2015

This new book, Deep Freeze Winter 2015: A Photographic Memory of Storm, Survival and Triumph will make you feel like a hero for having survived the winter of 2015 in the Maritimes.

Having been in the thick of it, I had forgotten a lot of the details. Reading how the weather evolved from month to month, from a green Christmas to the repeated onslaughts of March that left us feeling post-traumatic well into summer, brings back a lot of memories.

It’s a real tribute to the Maritime spirit of good humour and making the best of the weather. Stephanie Domet gets a cameo for coining the word – and hashtag – #stormchips. Collections of photos featuring drifted-in doorways, prospecting for cars, and sunbathers in shorts with beer against a snowy background, highlight some themes of that record-breaking winter.

There are serious photos, too: of buckled barns, stuck ships and the plane that slid on its belly when landing in Halifax on March 29.

shoveller on roof with snow in the air against a blue sky
My photo in the book: shovelling off the roof in March 2015

The pages are filled with full-colour photos taken by Maritimers from all over. I had seen some of them on Facebook or in the newspaper.  One of the photos is mine, thanks to this very website. A researcher for the book contacted me and I sent him a high-resolution version. In return, a copy of the book arrived in the mail last month.

Now that summer is over, and the next winter is lurking just around the corner, it’s good to remind ourselves of what stuff we are made, while we brace for hurricane season and the unknown adventures to be had just by living here.

Deep Freeze Winter 2015: A Photographic Memory of Storm, Survival and Triumph by John MacIntyre, forward by Cindy Day, MacIntyre Purcell Publishing Inc., 2015.

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The Legendary Winter that Was

The Maritimes had a winter like no other. Prince Edward Island had a record-breaking total snowfall of 549.6 cm, which works out to about 18 ft of snow (to date). Fortunately it didn’t fall all at once. Thanks to social media, images of people tunnelling through snowbanks to look for their cars, and Good Samaritans sculpting Grand Canyons so that neighbours could leave their homes, became etched into the popular consciousness.

backhoe
March 20, moving a lot of fluffy white stuff.

The volume of snow we got here on the South Shore of Nova Scotia wouldn’t faze Northern New Brunswick, but the fact is that we don’t have enough of the heavy equipment needed to handle it around here, as the amount was highly unusual. The usual driveway-clearing equipment, trucks with plows bolted on, were breaking down, and the big backhoes required to liberate some homes were charging $175 per driveway two days after the big storm of March 18. If I were in the snow clearing business, I’d be wondering whether this winter was a harbinger of more climate chaos and if I should invest in heavier equipment.

Many barns around the province caved in, and nurseries lost greenhouses, which are usually uninsurable.

As well as financially and physically, the winter was hard on many people psychologically. The storms came twice a week during a period that some called March Madness, and at times it felt like being bludgeoned repeatedly with a pool noodle reinforced with a hockey stick. There was Snowmageddon and Snowpocalypse and many unnamed storms which continued well into April.

I emerged from the winter with newfound upper body and core strength, and was grateful for my teenaged son who is looking buff these days.

Here are some photos from the winter that was.

 

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The big storm

The February 15-16 storm that completely buried cars in Prince Edward Island continues to make life difficult for Nova Scotians more than a week later. Tall snowbanks make driving and walking difficult and dangerous, especially in the towns. Elsewhere, snowshoes are the vehicle of choice. Clogged or hidden storm sewers result in flooding when it’s warm(ish) and thick ice when it’s cold, especially in Halifax.  Around Mahone Bay, people have been removing snow from roofs and decks to mitigate damage and leaks, especially whenever rain threatens. What a winter!

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After the storm

Ice pellets
Ice pellets

We had a whopper of a nor’easter last night. Schools closed early yesterday and it was a foregone conclusion that they’d be closed today. Many offices in the Maritimes are closed today.

Here close to the Atlantic coast, we had little rain though it was forecast. It came down as ice pellets. The top couple of inches are made of ice pellets, averaging about 1 mm in diameter.

We I don’t often get to ski on our road before it’s plowed, but at time of writing it still is covered, though it seems that 4-wheel drive trucks can get through.

As you can see, the snow drifts around to collect on the sheltered, south-facing side of my swingset greenhouse.

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The Juan-a-be Storm of the Year

8 years after Hurricane Juan, Point Pleasant Park still looked ragged.
8 years after Hurricane Juan, Point Pleasant Park still looked ragged in 2011.

In September 2003, Hurricane Juan swept through Nova Scotia like a giant chainsaw, wreaking havoc from Halifax’s Point Pleasant Park, inland across the province, all the way to PEI.

White-Juan_0083
After White Juan in Kentville. We had a lot of fun digging out.

Five months later, in February 2004, a “weather bomb” dumped a metre of snow on Nova Scotia and was unofficially named White Juan after the previous season’s hurricane. It paralyzed much of the province for several days as citizens dug out.

Rendering of the storm at 6 pm on March 26, showing wind direction and barometric pressure, from http://earth.nullschool.net/
Rendering of the storm off Nova Scotia at 6 pm on March 26, showing wind direction and barometric pressure, from http://earth.nullschool.net/

Today’s nor’easter has been unofficially dubbed “Juan-a-be”. Meteorologists apparently learned a lot from White Juan, and had this storm pegged to be a similarly serious weather event far in advance. Apparently all their computer models were pointing to the same story; that a low pressure system would form off Cape Hatteras and move up the coast, walloping Nova Scotia with wind, snow, rain and then more snow.

And so it has come to pass. One can only marvel at the science that can predict such things. Everyone was talking about the storm for days. We took it for granted that school would be cancelled. The bread shelves in the grocery store were emptied by shoppers preparing for power outages. All day, my Facebook feed was mostly about the storm, with people staying connected to each other even while isolated by impassible drifts.

The snow came sideways, starting this morning and continuing all day. It continues to blow even harder, having backed to the north, though less snow is falling.

The joke is that most of our winter storms this year have happened on Wednesdays!
Most of our winter storms this year have happened on Wednesdays!

In the late afternoon, at high tide, I made an excursion down the road to see what damage the storm surge might cause. The snow stung my face and the wind bent me over as I trudged along. In sections sheltered by evergreens on both sides of the road, the snow lay quiet and even, untouched by blade of plough or rubber tire. Elsewhere, the wind had swept the road bare.

Approaching the Oak Island causeway, I saw that the storm surge would not damage the road, even though the water level was high, because there was still ice along the shore which buffered the energy of the waves. The northeast winds did not travel far across water and did not raise high enough waves to do damage here.

But I can only imagine what is happening on the Northumberland shore.

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After the snowstorm

Two snow days in a row! The kids are happy. We have about 35cm/14″ of fluffy stuff on the ground. We’re glad we stayed on top of it yesterday during the storm, plowing the driveway twice, clearing the entrance after the snowplow went by, and keeping the car near the road and shoveled out, ready to go.

Scraping the car
A bit of scraping this morning after the storm.
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After the snowstorm

The storm predicted by the red sunrise in my last post has passed, leaving the world cleansed and transformed.

And so the shoveling begins.  We have about 3-4 inches of very dense snow here near Western Shore on the shore of Mahone Bay.  A friend near New Germany, inland, reports at least a foot and a half of “thick heavy snow”.  Meanwhile, someone in Kingsburg, which juts out into the Atlantic Ocean, has no snow at all!  This pattern is typical: rain near the coast, snow inland.

Here’s how a tidal inlet on Mahone Bay looked this morning:

Tidal inlet with snow
Jan. 13, 2011, after a snowstorm. Taken with a Fujifilm FinePix S1800 at the widest angle setting, equivalent to 28mm.
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Red sky at morning, sailors take warning

Sunrise this morning. Taken with a Fujifilm FinePix F1800 on a tripod.

Another storm is on its way.  This one is the kind of blizzard you’d expect in January, with 10 to 15 cm (4 to 6 inches) of snow.

Atlantic Canada has been in the news lately with a series of storms in December, one week after another.  If you just watched the weather channel you might think that we’re living in a disaster area and maybe that’s why I haven’t been posting frequently.

But where we live, we haven’t lost power for more than a minute, and we’ve escaped the brunt of the storms. The worst damage tends to be localized, and even though Nova Scotia is small, one side of the province often has very different weather than the other. Some weather systems track up the Bay of Fundy, for example, while others are phenomena of the Atlantic Ocean.  And the Margaree Valley has received a lot of rain which seems to get trapped by the surrounding mountains.

The Annapolis Valley was hard hit by one storm which downed many trees, knocking out so many power lines that it took days to restore full service.  Berwick United Church Camp, with its 500-year-old towering hemlocks, was badly hit, as was the Kentville Ravine which also has a stand of old growth hemlock.  I’ve seen photos of damage in both places on Facebook.  It is evident that some of the trees that came down were hollow and perhaps were near the end of their natural life.  Thus the storm did what storms do:  fell trees so that they can return to the soil and nurture new growth that will flourish in the sunlit openings they leave in their wake.  Much as it feels tragic to those who love those trees – and I speak as one who grew up attending Berwick Camp every summer and loved its cool, shaded grounds and majestic trees – this is Nature’s way of renewing itself.

So we’ll take what comes – what else can we do? – and hope the power stays on.

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Damage from Hurricane Earl

Grey birch on a neighbour's lawn

Many people were without power for a day or two due to trees and branches falling on power lines.

Damaged roller-reefing jib in Mahone Bay harbour
Floating cabin
One of the two floating cabins in Mahone Bay harbour dragged its mooring inland.
Battered spider's web
Who's the strongest of us all? This spider's web is battered but not broken.