Here comes the sun! But before we get to that, let’s quickly talk about the severe storm that swept through southern Alberta on Wednesday. Environment and Climate Change Canada has released some preliminary information about the afternoon storm, which produced loonie to golf ball-sized hail and damaging winds for southeast Alberta. The strongest wind gust was recorded in Atlee at 147 km/h – which ranks as an EF1 windstorm on the Enhanced Fujita Scale – while other areas like Brooks would rank as an EF0 event. We likely won’t see much more severe storm weather for the next while. Starting Thursday morning, a broad ridge of high pressure is pushing in and will be stabilized by two low-pressure systems on each side. As you can tell by the image below, this weather pattern is your classic ‘Omega Block’ setup. The two lows flanking the ridge will keep this block in place for several days. Models right now show the high pressure remaining over Calgary well into next week, perhaps even for the rest of August. This means lots of sunshine and stability, which will allow for the summer heat to build over the weekend into the mid-to-high twenties throughout the province. While the weather will be pleasant and a great time to be outside, Albertans will still need to be vigilant when it comes to being both sun smart and fire smart, especially with the long weekend quickly approaching. The 10-day trend shows the peak heat will hit next Wednesday, but remain consistently warm and sunny heading into the final days of August.
