The Arctic Post

Today we are finally experiencing true northern weather. There are blizzard warnings for the entire Kivalliq region. It started yesterday and is supposed to potentially last until Thursday. This is the weather warning currently on for our region.

Warnings

Chesterfield Inlet
9:11 AM CST Tuesday 29 December 2009
Blizzard warning for
Chesterfield Inlet continued

Major blizzard continues to affect Kivalliq. Blizzard to last into Thursday for some communities.

A deep low pressure system north of Southampton Island combined with a strong ridge of high pressure over the Northwest Territories continues to produce strong northwesterly winds over the Kivalliq region maintaining blizzard conditions throughout the area.

Northwesterly winds of 50 gusting to 70 or 80 km/h continue to give widespread near zero visibilities in blowing snow over most of the Kivalliq region. Rankin Inlet has now had over 50 continuous hours of blizzard conditions since the blizzard began Sunday.

Blizzard conditions are expected to continue over Baker Lake and Arviat today into Thursday. Indications are blizzard conditions will ease over Chesterfield Inlet and Rankin Inlet Wednesday afternoon and evening as winds ease somewhat. However blizzard conditions may redevelop over those communities Wednesday night into Thursday as northwest winds increase again. The blizzard should end over all areas by Friday as lighter winds finally move in across the Kivalliq.

Further north the blizzard is expected to end at Repulse Bay this afternoon as winds diminish.

The blizzard will be accompanied by temperatures around the minus 25c mark with wind chill values of minus 40 to minus 45.

We have been told that this isn’t a full-blown blizzard. I am anxious to see how much worse it really can get.

This kind of weather means no planes. When no planes land, it means no groceries are being brought in. This also means no mail is either coming in or leaving. We went to the grocery store yesterday for a few items and there really wasn’t much left in terms of perishables. There was a little bit of milk, but the expiry date was December 31st.

When we first moved up here, we really didn’t know what to expect in terms of severe weather. We were prepared for cold. Up until now, we haven’t experienced anything different than weather we had down south. I was starting to wonder if it really was going to get much colder than northern Alberta temperatures.  Today is my first experience with awful weather.  These are days that i’m thankful I don’t have to go out in the weather if I don’t want to.  I couldn’t imagine working in this.

I’m very happy that we have planned for this kind of weather. During the fall and early in the winter, we prepared many meals for times like this. Currently our freezer is stocked with homemade shepherd’s pie, chicken pot pies, soup of all varieties, chili, casseroles, etc.  We have also been freezing milk. It’s comforting to know that we will be able to eat well while this blizzard continues. I don’t know how long until the store shelves are stocked again with fresh fruit, vegetables, diary and meat. I currently have a food mail order somewhere between Winnipeg and here. I’m not sure when we will actually receive it.

I think today is going to be a scrapbooking and reading day. Maybe with a hot cup of tea!

I have to add that yesterday I finally dove into my scrapbooking. I completed two pages. They definitely aren’t perfect, but I do have to admit I did pretty good for my first time . It will only get better from here.

Below are a few pictures I took today. If you refer back to the pictures I posted  in the “Our New Home” post,  you will be able to see what we normally see from our back door.  Today all I see is white. You can barely see the houses across the street. The winds are crazy.

This would normally be the Hudson's Bay

Our back door

Out our front door

If you look closely at the above photo, you can see the outline of the house across the street.

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This entry was posted on Tuesday, December 29th, 2009 at 13:27 and is filed under The Experience. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.