Saskatchewan weather set to improve throughout rest of week

The frigid cold snap that plunged most of Saskatchewan into extreme cold warnings is about to end.

The weather throughout the province on Tuesday evening and early Wednesday morning saw temperatures drop to lows around -35 C.

Environment Canada meteorologist Rose Carlsen explained what we can expect to see as we move through Wednesday afternoon.

“It is quite cold this morning, but we’re actually going to expect (the temperature) to moderate this afternoon in Regina,” she said. “We’re expecting the same for Saskatoon and most of Saskatchewan.”

Regina and Saskatoon are both expected to hit a high of -14 C on Wednesday afternoon.

While that is a 20-degree warm-up from Tuesday night, Carlsen said the wind chill will still be a factor on Wednesday.

“It’s still going to feel like a bit of a bite because we’re expecting some gustier winds today,” she said.

“Nothing crazy, but with temperatures as cold as they are, it’s going to feel more significant. The air temperature is going to be rising, (but) unfortunately with the winds, it’ll still feel kind of chilly. But at least we’ll be pulling out of the extreme cold wind chills as the day goes on.”

The weather office is anticipating Regina and parts of southern Saskatchewan to see winds gust around 30 kilometres per hour. In Saskatoon it’s expected to be slightly less at 20 km/h.

As we head into the weekend, temperatures in Regina and Saskatoon are expected to reach as high as -9 C.

Saskatchewan’s early-morning cold broke records for the most frigid temperatures historically on Dec. 7 in nine communities.

Assiniboia, Broadview, Elbow, Estevan, Hudson Bay, Moose Jaw, Watrous, Weyburn and Yorkton all set records for new lows on this date.

Estevan reached -37.3 C, breaking the previous 103-year-old low of -33.3 C.

The most significant drop in temperatures happened in Weyburn. That community reached -39.6 C Wednesday morning, a 6.3-degree drop from the previous record of -33.3 C.