Melting snow like this will soon become a more common sight in Prince Albert with temperatures above zero every day for the next week. (Cam Lee/northeastNOW Staff)

By Rob Mahon

Warm Weather At Last

Temperatures to break zero-degree barrier every day for a week

Mar 15, 2022 | 12:00 PM

Both on the calendar and in the real world, spring is still some way off in Prince Albert. We’ll get a brief taste of something closer to spring weather this week, however.

For the next seven days in a row, Environment Canada predicts daytime highs at or above the zero-degree mark for the Prince Albert area. It’s the first stretch like this the region has seen for quite some time.

“We’re in a pretty good spring pattern here,” said Alysa Pederson, meteorologist with Environment Canada. “So we’re getting temperatures going above the zero mark to three degrees right for the next seven days. Those are daytime highs though. Overnight lows are still going to be below zero.”

What we’re seeing this week is not so much a dramatic warm-up as a return to normal. Average highs for this time of year are around -1 Celsius, and while we’ll be above that at the high all week, it’s a dramatic shift from some days that got into the -30 C range in the last couple of weeks.

“What we’re looking at is most of the active weather and the cold air is being held in the arctic or held further north,” said Pederson. “So we’re in what we call a zonal flow. That’s where yes, it’s warm, and yes, there’s warm air, but we’re going to get a couple of weak little snowstorms that’ll be moving through Saskatchewan over the next couple of days.”

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The good news about these temperatures is they’re not so warm that the snow will all melt away in a handful of days and pose a massive flooding risk. The bad news is we could be in for another freeze-thaw cycle and one of the more dramatic ones of the year at that.

“With the overnight lows going into your -5 C and some of them if you have clear skies might drop a little bit lower into -10 C,” Pederson said. “If you get melts during the day any melt you have, even if it’s just a little bit, is likely to freeze again overnight. The more days we have like this in a row, the slipperier it will get over the week.”

Pederson mentioned that with the temperature steadily above zero during the day, there is a chance we see some sleet or freezing rain among that snow. She also said there have been extremely cold days this late in the month before, but the closer we get to the official start of spring, the less likely that becomes.

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rob.mahon@pattisonmedia.com

On Twitter: @RobMahonPxP