Our Coldest Weather Yet

March 16, 2021

 

Looking back I see that it has been six weeks since I last wrote, and since we work two weeks on and two weeks off, and at the time that I last wrote we were just going back to work, we have now worked two shifts and had one chunk off.  We just finished our last day of our March shift today. 

On our February 2nd to 16th shift we ended up having our coldest spell of winter weather and had sustained lows down to minus 10 with out-flowing winds bringing the wind chill down to minus 22.  It was a cold time at work, but also enjoyable as it was dry and very neat to see all of the ice formations.   

We left the water running out of every hose, pipe, or tap so as to prevent the lines from freezing and so many cool ice formations formed.   

 

February 8^th was a very special day at work.  It was the first day since November that we had sunshine on the tanks.  It lasted for only 20 minutes, but it was the start!

Because we had had two weeks of dry weather before this particular cold spell, the spill over of the dam actually ran dry.   

It was the first time that Jason and I had ever seen it dry, but when we exclaimed to residents about it, we were told that normally it runs dry several times through the summer as well, and that it was just because of all of the rain that we got last year that we never saw the lake level drop.  It definitely looked odd to see it dry, and when we got snow the whole sloping wall of the dam became a white wall.  

View from the top of the dam.

Also during the cold weather Jason and I came home from work for our lunch break so as to keep the fire going.  Normally we take our lunch to work, but we found that if we stoked up the fire really well in the morning, that it would keep burning until we were home for lunch.  Our lunch hour was then long enough to get the fire roaring once again and we were able to stoke it up and have it warm when we got home in the evening.  On two separate days we were lucky enough to see a massive snow tornado travelling along outside our house.  The first one was over our neighbour’s house across the street, and it was almost as wide as their house and a towering column of swirling snow.  It moved along until it was over the next house before it dissipated.  The second one that we saw, formed on the road.  It was fast moving and much smaller, although still the width of the road.  It whirled around until it veered off of the road and dissipated.  They were  both very cool to see. 

On one of the first really cold days, we were very surprised when we came home and found that we had no running water.  We called our neighbour and found out that they did have water, which meant that it was not the town-water system that was the problem, but our own house, and since it was warm inside, but cold outside, it probably meant that the line was frozen.  It took us a while to trace out the water lines, as there was no clear indication of where our water came into the house, but we found it.  The pipe came above ground to come into the house, and it was only protected by a small wooden box and some very thin insulation; clearly not enough for those temperatures.  We put an electric heater outside in a bigger box up against the wall around the pipe, and within half an hour we had water once again.  Luckily there was no damage done and we learned that we needed to leave the water running a bit when it was really cold outside.