Airdrie residents scratched their heads yesterday as some observed intense lightning flashing and a severe thunderstorm warning being issued for the area.
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Alysa Pederson, a Warning Preparedness Meteorologist with Environment and Climate Change, said that while such weather warnings have happened before, including a 2017 tornado that touched down near Medicine Hat, what residents experienced last night was indeed rare.
"This is not something we see yearly," she said. "This storm, specifically, was relatively intense, and most of what we heard came out of the storm itself."
There were reports of large hail, which precipitated the warning.
"We received reports of stones of two to three centimetres in diameter; that's pretty large," Pederson added.
But what of thundersnow? Did it happen yesterday? Pederson said if residents saw snow falling and saw the lightning, and heard the thunder, that could be classified as thundersnow, which, while uncommon, is not as unusual as one might think; a severe thunderstorm warning is much rarer.
"Thundersnow likely happens every couple of years somewhere in the province," she added.
Pederson explained that while the assumption of favourable thunderstorm conditions means warmer temperatures, nearing the 10-degree mark, that's not always the case.
"It's just a balance between the lower parts of the atmosphere, near the ground, and what the temperature is high up. If you have really cold air higher up in the atmosphere, as long as there's relatively warmer air at the surface [and] in yesterday's case, we were looking at minus 20 in the higher parts of the atmosphere and five degrees at the surface," Pederson said. "That's enough of an imbalance that it creates instability within the atmosphere, and it can cause rising motion, creating a thunderstorm."
She added that yesterday's weather was also due to a cold front moving through the province. This front is expected to pass, leading to slightly warmer temperatures in the following days. As for Halloween, minimal precipitation is anticipated across the province, and it's unlikely that more weird weather will happen, at least for now.
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