Major Winter Storm Will Bring Over 100mm of Rain, Up to 75cm of Snow, and Substantial Amounts of Freezing Rain to Newfoundland This Weekend

Newfoundland is going to be hit by quite the winter storm beginning later this afternoon and continuing straight through to Sunday evening. This storm has a lot of moisture associated with it which will fall as a combination of rain, snow, and freezing rain. The dominant precipitation type will vary depending on location; heavy snow in the Northern Peninsula, mostly rain along the South Coast and Eastern Newfoundland, and freezing rain centrally.

The storm will start with light snow near Port aux Basques around noon today and it will spread northeastward across the Island. After a couple of hours of light snow, heavier snow will move in. By the evening, most of the Island will be seeing snow, with the exception being the Eastern Avalon. It’s at this point that the warmer air will start to push its way across the province, resulting in a transition from rain to snow overnight into Saturday morning. Conditions will start to become messy on Saturday.

The warm air and rain will only extend as far north as the Northern Peninsula, where upwards of 75cm of snow is expected to fall by Sunday evening. Between the snow and rain, there will be a pocket of temperatures that will hover around 0° and freezing rain will fall. This area will shift throughout the day, bringing even light freezing rain to a large swath of Western and Central Newfoundland. A stretch from Corner Brook and Deer Lake to Grand Falls-Windsor will receive heavy freezing rain for the better part of 18 hours tomorrow. This area can expect in excess of 40mm (1.5 inches) of ice accretion.

Overnight Saturday into Sunday, the snow will end in the Northern Peninsula and there will be a brief reprieve in the freezing rain before it re-intensifies late Sunday morning and lasts into the afternoon. Unfortunately, we are not seeing much of a warm-up for the areas hit the hardest by the freezing rain until Tuesday and this level of ice accretion will easily bring down large branches and trees as well as power lines. It is important that if you live in this area, to be prepared for prolonged power outages.

To the South and Southeast, the main story from this storm will be the rain. Most of Southern Newfoundland can expect at least 50mm of rain and there will be an area of up to 100mm expected to fall by Sunday evening. For St. John’s and the Eastern Avalon, 30-50mm will fall.