Ice storm moves east after causing icy roads, power outages in SW Ontario

Residents in many parts of southwestern Ontario are waking up this morning to a nightmare of icy roads and power outages due to a blanket of freezing rain that was dropped on the region overnight.

The areas hardest hit so far by the ice storm are from Highway 401 between London and Kitchener, northward into the Bruce Peninsula. Roadways throughout the area are covered with ice, and over 60,000 homes and businesses are without electricity this morning due to downed power lines. Those living closer to Lake Ontario, such as in the Greater Toronto Area, were spared the worst effects of the storm as the lake helped to keep things a little warmer and prevent ice from building up.

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Flights into and out of Toronto Pearson Airport are running better this morning, but there are still some cancellations and delays for flights to and from other cities affected by this storm.

School buses are cancelled again today in many areas and several school boards have closed schools for the day.

The storm is pressing eastward this morning, and the freezing rain warnings are moving eastward as a result. Environment Canada lifted the warning for the City of Toronto, but it remains in effect in regions to the west and northwest of the GTA, and the warnings have been expanded all the way east to Cornwall and north along the shores of Georgian Bay. Winter storm warnings are in effect for Ottawa, as they are expecting a mix of snow, ice pellets and freezing rain today, and regions of southwestern Quebec are under a snowfall warning due to the 15 to 20 centimetres of snow they could receive throughout the day today.

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Weather conditions should improve some in southwestern Ontario today as the temperature finally pushes up above freezing, but it could be some time before all the problems are resolved from the messy weather that passed through last night.

(Photo courtesy: Frank Gunn/The Canadian Press)

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