“Who would’ve thought?” said Wayne Kakfwi, staring at snow on the ground on July 25 as he made his way from the gun range in Norman Wells.
Snow fell in the Sahtu on Saturday, a practically unheard-of occurrence that continued an extraordinary few days of weather across much of the NWT.
To the northeast, Paulatuk is in the middle of receiving multiple times its average July rainfall in two days.
Fifty mm of rain had fallen on the community between Thursday night and Saturday morning, according to Environment Canada, and another 25 to 50 mm is expected before the rain eases on Sunday.
“This amount of rainfall in one storm is very rare for the community, and about three to four times the average rainfall for the entire month of July,” a Saturday advisory stated.
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“Significant property damage is likely. Damage to some critical infrastructure is possible.”
A snowfall warning for Fort Good Hope has now ended but more heavy rain is expected, with up to 80 mm forecast overall. Conditions were expected to be similar in Colville Lake. The snowfall warning was one of the first for Canada in July, other than high Arctic locations, since snow fell in Red Deer in July 1999.
Norman Wells received 25 mm of rain on Friday, with wind gusts upward of 70 km/h, before Saturday’s snow arrived.
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Meanwhile, in the Beaufort Delta, video shot in Inuvik showed minor damage to buildings over the past two days from high winds.
Tuktoyaktuk’s weather station reported sustained winds on Friday of more than 90 km/h and gusts beyond 130 km/h. Kitti Hall was opened for people who lost power.
At Tsiigehtchic, Lawrence Norbert said the MV Louis Cardinal ferry had been temporarily suspended during Friday’s high winds.
The two Dempster Highway ferry crossings were described as “intermittent” by the NWT’s Department of Infrastructure on Friday because of the wind.
The extent of damage from the recent weather wasn’t immediately clear.
