Is Yellowknife’s winter any snowier than usual?

After two years of drought, a wet and snowy winter in Yellowknife might not be the worst thing in the world. Are we getting one?

Meh, the data suggests.

Snowfall in Yellowknife has been quite consistent lately: six of the past seven weeks have involved seven to 12 centimetres of snow falling.

According to Environment Canada’s measurements, conditions this fall have resulted in more snow building up on the ground in the NWT capital than in recent years.

Those measurements showed 43 cm of snow on the ground in the city as of Friday last week. Only 1974, which was a record year, had more by that point.

But how much snow stays on the ground relies on a wide range of factors, and doesn’t necessarily mean it’s been an ultra-snowy fall.

Data for the snowfall itself doesn’t suggest this is shaping up to be a record-breaker, although the period between October and December might end up being above average by the end of the month.

As of last week, 62.6 cm of snow had fallen since the start of October with more than three weeks of December still to run. The average for the October-December period in Yellowknife is around 77 cm. The record, also in 1974, is 136.9 cm.

Even an above-average amount of snowfall won’t automatically help water levels. Many factors dictate what happens to that snow after it falls, including the type of snow and a process named sublimation, where some snow turns directly into water vapour rather than melting into water.

Some change ahead?

Hydrologists have said many areas of the NWT need months of above-average precipitation – either rain or snow – to solve the current drought.

The NWT government released its latest water monitoring bulletin this week. The broader picture is one of not much change so far, although there are hints that a shift may be on the way.

“Early winter water levels and flow rates remain very low across most of the NWT and in many instances are similar to those recorded last year at this time,” the report reads, referring to the record-breaking lows of 2023.

“Low water levels continue to be the result of extreme drought conditions that began in the summer of 2022 and have persisted through 2023 and 2024,” the report adds.

“November precipitation across the NWT was generally below average, except Fort Smith, which received above-average precipitation.”

By Friday last week, Fort Smith had recorded 33.3 cm of snowfall since the start of October, which is in line with recent years but less than the town’s average in years prior to that. A reasonable amount of rain also fell in October, contributing to overall precipitation.

Hay River had recorded snowfall of 13.2 cm by the same point in December, which again is comparable to the past few years but well below what the town ordinarily records. (In 2012, the figure for October to December was 191 cm. A more representative quarterly figure might be 60-100 cm.)

Inuvik’s weather station doesn’t report snowfall but does track snow on the ground, which by December 6 had reached 25 cm, well below the figure for this time last year – an extraordinarily snowy year – and more in keeping with a regular winter.

Norman Wells has posted snowfall of 32.9 cm since the start of October, which is less than half of the snow the town would record over that period in most years, though much of December still remains.

Water levels along the Mackenzie River and on Great Slave Lake depend greatly on the rain and snow that falls in northern BC, Alberta, Saskatchewan and the southern stretches of the NWT.

In the water monitoring bulletin, the GNWT said precipitation in northern BC and Alberta had been “approximately average” this fall.

However, the community of Mackenzie in BC – near the headwaters of the Peace River and part of a region that contributes a significant amount of water to the Mackenzie River – “has received record high cumulative precipitation this fall,” the bulletin added.

Meanwhile, the territory said federal climate forecasts “indicate higher than normal precipitation for most of the NWT and the Mackenzie River basin.”

That could mean we start to see changes in the current prolonged period of low water levels, though it’s still too early to be certain.