According to Environment Canada, February has been as cold as advertised for Vanderhoof.
To answer the question on whether or not it’s the coldest February on record, Meteorologist, Ross McDonald spoke with My Nechako Valley Now.
“As it stands, we are right there in terms of the coldest February on record with an average temperature of minus eighteen in Prince George. Typically, the temperature is around minus five so we’re actually sitting about 13 degrees below normal temperatures.”
Local residents had lots of practice bundling up and even dressing in layers.
However, McDonald points out the month was equally as dry as it was chilly.
“We’re roughly looking at about 29 centimetres of snow for the Prince George average and for the month, we only saw about half of that at 13.”
As we flip the page to March, the deep freeze Prince George has experienced will continue.
“As we turn the page into a new month, we’re seeing this pattern continue and certainly it looks like the first week of March we’ll be sitting with temperatures below seasonal.”
When asked how we got to this frigid point, McDonald states a very stubborn system continues to have a firm grip on the province, not giving much chance for a reprieve.
“We saw a very persistent north to a northeasterly flow pattern develop right across British Columbia and drawing down, cold, cold arctic air from the Northwest Territories as well as the Yukon and it was basically a pattern we established during the early part of February.”
The weekend forecast is expected to be cold and dry to kick off March with predicted daily highs of -11 and -13 with overnight low’s dipping into the minus twenties.