WIND WARNING in effect for North Coast/Haida Gwaii

An intense Pacific Front is making its way towards
Haida Gwaii and then on to the North Coast

There's good news and bad news on the weather front for the Family Day long weekend.

On the positive side, it's unlikely that there will be much snow left by Sunday, as mild air and precipitation arrives on the North Coast.

However, with the change in the weather will come an intense Pacific front and strong winds, making for a situation that has already resulted in a change to the BC Ferry schedule ( see here )

Environment Canada has issues a Wind Warning for the North Coast and Haida Gwaii, calling for winds from 90 km/h and gusting to 110 km/h as it makes landfall .

The strong winds arrive on Haida Gwaii in the evening period, crossing Hecate Strait to the North Coast near midnight, it's expected that the winds will ease by late Sunday morning.

Precipitation for the next forty eight hours will bring 10 mm of rain through the day today and another 15 mm overnight, with Showers in the forecast for Sunday.

The forecast moving into the Family Day holiday Monday and beyond calls for more rain through the week.

Further inland, communities east of Prince Rupert are now under a Winter Storm Warning, calling for a mixture of Snow, changing to Rain as the Pacific front moves inland.

Storm Warnings have been issued for all Marine areas of the North Coast

The Marine Forecast now has a Storm Warning in effect with winds from the South 25 to 35 knots set to increase to Southeast 60 knots by this evening, with Waves of up 7 metres building through the evening and overnight period.

With the front coming ashore travel conditions may change, you can access the latest road information from the Drive BC website, for a quick look at conditions through the network of Highway cameras across the Northwest see our link here.

With conditions changing BC Ferries has cancelled the Saturday 3:30 PM sailing from Prince Rupert to Skidegate,  with the rescheduled departure time now listed as 6 AM on Sunday. 

They have posted their modified Sailing schedule here

Any further updates\can be found from the BC Ferries Service Notices page.

A look back at some of the previous weather events for the region can be found on our archive page.