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Snowflake

Mountain passes in Colorado covered with May snow

Spring Snow Blankets Colorado's San Juan Mountains
Spring snow blankets Colorado's San Juan Mountains
A wet spring storm brought rain to lower elevations and snow to the high country Friday across much of Southwest Colorado.

Snow was so heavy and unexpected in the higher elevations that it closed two mountain passes on U.S. Highway 550 and prompted a winter weather advisory for parts of the San Juan Mountains.

Both lanes of U.S. Highway 550 reopened Friday afternoon after a temporary closure over Coal Bank and Molas passes, south of Silverton, because of adverse, snowy weather conditions.

The National Weather Service issued a winter weather advisory for areas of the southwestern and eastern San Juan Mountains above 10,000 feet in elevation. The advisory, which advises drivers to use caution on the roads, is in effect until midnight Friday.


Comment: Prairies kick off 'unofficial start to summer' with heavy snow and ice


Snowflake Cold

Prairies kick off 'unofficial start to summer' with heavy snow and ice

Snow in Waterton, Alberta on May 21
Snow in Waterton, Alberta on May 21
Though deemed the "unofficial kickoff to summer," things are looking and feeling a lot more wintry across parts of the Prairies to start the May long weekend.

After beginning the week with some of the first 30-degree weather of the year, the mid-summer like heat quickly gave way to tumbling temperatures, setting the scene for a much more wintry end to the week. Snowfall and freezing rain warnings spanned Alberta and Saskatchewan through Friday morning, with difficult travel being reported on some major highway routes.

As much as 10-20+ cm of snow was forecast through the hardest hit areas, as temperatures hovered close to the freezing mark -- a 30-degree drop for most places from Monday. Persistent freezing rain has also taken a toll across parts of southern Saskatchewan, snapping tree branches and resulting in local power outages.

The good news is, conditions will gradually improve through Saturday, as temperatures attempt to rebound to more seasonal values. Some of the warmest weather will actually be felt across northern Alberta, with daytime highs reaching the lower 20s by Sunday.


Snowflake

Snow hits Mongolia's capital as summer nears

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Heavy snowfall hit Mongolia's capital early Saturday morning, despite summertime approaching.

The air temperature in Ulan Bator, which was around 20 degrees Celsius midday Friday, has dropped to 1 degree Celsius by Saturday noon.

In Mongolia, March, April and May are spring months, with weather conditions changing widely day-to-day or hour-to-hour.

Source: Xinhua


Snowflake

Late May Sierra snowstorm catches visitors, some locals off guard

Jennifer Baker submitted this photo of snow in Coleville, Calif.
© Jennifer BakerMay snow in Coleville, Calif.
Tonya Daugherty was visiting the region from North Carolina and wasn't expecting snow during her trip to the Sierra.

"Nobody back home is going to believe this," she said.

The late spring Sierra storm even caught locals off guard. They heard about the winter storm advisory but didn't expect to see a winter wonderland this late in May.

"I'm used to the snow but I'm not used to the snow when it should be almost summer," said Mike Lake.

"Usually the weather is really nice during this time of year but I guess it just decided to up and dump on us randomly," Talia Moore said.

But not everyone was surprised. Scott Lee says he's seen snowfall in the Sierra well into summer.


Snowflake

Heavy snow falls in Western Montana on May 20

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A storm brought gusting wind and snow to much of central and western Montana on May 20, causing power outages, the National Weather Service said.

"Wet, heavy snow on freshly leafed-out trees is causing plenty of broken limbs and weighing on power lines, resulting in a bunch of smaller outages, per the [NorthWestern Energy] outage map," the NWS reported.

The NWS issued winter weather warnings and advisories for most of central Montana, advising that some areas in higher elevations could get up to 18 inches of snow by Saturday, May 22.


Snowflake

Best of the Web: Global cooling underway: Record-breaking cold blasts Australia and Canada

cold
Arctic air continues to descend unusually-far south, while Antarctic air continues to ride anomalously-far north. The culprit is low solar activity, namely its weakening of the jet streams, and the upshot is COOLING across the lower-latitudes (where us humans reside).

AUSTRALIA

Swathes of Australia are shivering through a record-breaking cold snap, with the frosty mornings set to continue across eastern parts through the weekend.

The mercury in Sydney dropped to 8.6C (47.5F) at 7am early Thursday, marking the fifth-straight day of mornings below 9C (48.2F).

Not since the year 1967 has Sydney experienced a colder streak in May.

Back then, the temperature fell below 9C (48.2F) for six nights in a row.

Comment: Crazy weather in Edmonton, Alberta - Heavy snowfall on May 18


Snowflake

Crazy weather in Edmonton, Alberta - Heavy snowfall on May 18

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It's the 18th of May and still experiencing a heavy snowfall here in Alberta.


Ice Cube

World's largest iceberg A-76 breaks off of Antarctica

Antarctica ice berg
© ESA/Earth ObservationThe humongous chunk of ice calved from the western side of the Ronne Ice Shelf in Antarctica.
An enormous iceberg, a little bigger than the state of Rhode Island, has broken off of Antarctica.

The finger-shaped chunk of ice, which is roughly 105 miles (170 kilometers) long and 15 miles (25 kilometers) wide, was spotted by satellites as it calved from the western side of Antarctica's Ronne Ice Shelf, according to the European Space Agency. The berg is now floating freely on the Weddell Sea, a large bay in the western Antarctic where explorer Ernest Shackleton once lost his ship, the Endurance, to pack ice.

The 1,667-square-mile (4,320 square kilometers) iceberg — which now the world's biggest and has been called A-76, after the Antarctic quadrant where it was first spotted — was captured by the European Union's Copernicus Sentinel, a two-satellite constellation that orbits Earth's poles. The satellites confirmed an earlier observation made by the British Antarctic Survey, which was the first organization to notice the breakaway.

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Snowflake

Czech Republic - Snow in mid-May - Global warming is a hoax

SNOW
"There is really an extreme amount of snow," said Aleš Hnízdo, operations director of Labská bouda in the Giant Mountains.

The surroundings of labská Bouda in the giant mountains remain covered with a large layer of snow even in mid-May. The situation is being exploited by cross-country skiers.

There is even so much snow that even a snow blower was unable to bite through the huge barriers to the Elbe shed.

"According to driver Jaroslav Palivoda, who has been milling the road for 37 years, he has experienced this only three or four times in all those years.

On Thursday, the snow blower finally bit through the snow barriers at the Hanče and Vrbata mounds.

See video.

Ice Cube

Best of the Web: Europe's extreme May freeze is set to continue

snow cover
Near-term models don't know whether they're coming or going. This meridional jet stream flow is throwing them for a loop. And after fooling many MSM publications into running headlines such as "Intense 10 day Heatwave set to strike Europe," the models have now flipped, and are forecasting yet more Arctic cold.

Below was the scene on May 8 in northern England:


"May time blizzard makes us shiver," tweeted the YorkshireSpeherdess, who runs a successful sheep farm.

"You can't believe this is May," she says in the video.

"It's just like the middle of winter."


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