Snow expected to make mess of morning commute
Coquihalla Highway reopens after avalanches last week
Snow blanketed coastal cities Saturday and Sunday, testing road crews and thrilling residents who rolled backyard snowmen and skied across parks that were green just days before.
The wet snow was costly for some drivers, with multi- vehicle accidents reported on roads throughout Metro Vancouver. Despite the efforts of road crews across the region, this morning’s rush hour commute could be worse.
As much as five more centimetres of snow was forecast to fall overnight, according to an Environment Canada snowfall warning posted Sunday. Lower elevation areas in the region may see just a couple of centimetres overnight, according to the warning, but anyone headed to higher elevation destinations like Burnaby Mountain could face difficult road conditions.
By this afternoon, the warm front over the south coast of B. C. is forecast to weaken and give way to rain and temperatures above 3 C, meaning the snow may soon be gone.
Estimates of how much snow had accumulated in cities across the Lower Mainland varied widely, according to an Environment Canada weather summary, but the department’s own estimates put Abbotsford in the lead with 20 cm, followed by North and West Vancouver with 15 cm each at higher elevations. On Vancouver Island, Environment Canada reported nearly 30 cm of accumulated snowfall on the Malahat Highway.
While some coastal residents found themselves snowed in on Sunday, cross- province travellers and truckers finally received respite from a week of prolonged highway closures due to avalanches and serious accidents.
The Coquihalla Highway reopened on the weekend after a huge avalanche ripped across it last week. The slide was the second in three days to cover the highway and it came from an avalanche pathway that had not reached the highway in 27 years.
Weakness at the base of a heavy and growing snowpack was to blame for the slides, said Mike Boissonneault, manager of avalanche and weather programs at the Ministry of Transportation and Infrastructure, who added that avalanche forecasters may only see conditions like those on the Coquihalla once or twice in their career.
Helicopter crews dropped explosives onto the deep, unstable snow near the highway on Friday and Saturday before the road was cleared and then reopened. It was one of the largest avalanche control operations in the highway’s history, according to ministry officials.
The high avalanche risk is forecast to extend into the week, according to a special warning from the Canadian Avalanche Centre. The notice told backcountry users to be conservative in their terrain choices, carry an avalanche transceiver, probe and shovel, and be wellversed in rescue skills.