Prince George is in for three more days of plus temperatures as we say goodbye to 2023.
Daytime highs of plus five are anticipated between now and Sunday.
This comes after a 104-year-old temperature record fell in PG as Thursday’s high reached 8.7 degrees – the old record was 7.8 set back in 1919.
Environment Canada Meteorologist, Brian Proctor explained to MyPGNow.com what has led to the long-standing spring weather during the winter season.
“What we really have going on is that we have two factors happening that has triggered this for us. One is a really strong El Nino, which has brought a lot of warm air up into the Pacific and the second thing is we have had a really strong blocking ridge over top the interior.”
“What it has really done is let the warm air come in but sort of ring out all the moisture and winds largely on the west side of the Coast Mountains. They have been seeing significant wind and rainfall events on the north and central coast by Vancouver Island – all we have seen is mostly clouds and warm temperatures to a vast degree.”
He added PG will experience its first real dose of a winter chill next week with daytime highs only reaching the minus double-digits.
“It’s going to be a shock to a lot of people’s systems at this point because we have become so accustomed to this warm weather. Just be prepared for that change in the weather pattern for next week – we are not seeing any real significant snowfall yet as that modified arctic starts to settle back in the central interior but I wouldn’t be surprised to see some snow accompany it by the end of the work week.”
As for the weekend coming up, Proctor noted it will still be quite warm for this time of year but any chance of another record falling by the wayside is pretty slim.
“We are seeing a lot of warm air flooding in from the coast and we are still seeing significant amounts of warm air coming in. The temperatures over the next three days until the 31st are trending to near normal. So, I think we are seeing the peak of the highest temperatures – we may see another one today (a new record) but after that it is back to generally seasonal values.”
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