Canada hit with winter weather already, but will it stay for all of December?

Winter has already done something that it didn’t do last year. It has shown up for the month of December, and it just began.

Is winter just making a brief appearance this month? Or, will it stay for the holidays? Please read on for a look ahead at the month of December.

But first, here is a quick reminder of what December 2023 looked like across Canada. The various shades of orange, red and brown on the map below highlight the much warmer-than-normal temperatures that dominated the month from coast to coast.

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Many places where a white Christmas is taken for granted saw a rare green or brown Dec. 25 last year, including Edmonton, Alta., and Regina and Saskatoon, Sask.

This year, it became easy to assume that winter wasn’t going to show up for December yet again as most of Canada saw one of the warmest fall seasons on record. There was little sign of winter deep into November.

However, a major pattern reversal started to unfold during late November. Winter finally arrived! Winter weather stormed the field across Western Canada, and then it turned its sights on Eastern Canada as we made the transition from November to December.

Here is a look at the temperature anomalies for the final five days of November. The various shades of green, blue and purple highlight much colder-than-normal temperatures.

As we continue to progress through early December, the focus of the Arctic air will continue to shift into Eastern Canada. Meanwhile, Western Canada will see a period of much milder weather.

Here is a look at the dominant temperature pattern for early December (roughly the first 10 days of the month).

Many places in Eastern Canada will see their coldest start to December in over a decade. However, that really just highlights our extended streak of mild starts to December as temperatures won’t actually be significantly colder than normal.

We have already seen that this pattern is favourable for epic, lake-effect snow in the snowbelt regions around the Great Lakes. On the other hand, this is not a favourable pattern for heavy snow for most of the cities across Eastern Canada, including Toronto, Windsor, Ottawa, Montreal and Halifax.

This pattern only allows for clippers to track across the region. These systems often bring windy conditions, but tend to be moisture-starved and snow totals are not as heavy as what we can see from Colorado or Texas lows. However, on occasion, a clipper can intensity off the East Coast of the U.S. and become a significant storm for parts of Atlantic Canada.

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After completing its cross-country tour, the Arctic air will take a break, and milder weather will continue to spread east across the country during the second week of December.

But that will not be the end of winter!

During the middle of and late December, we expect that Western Canada will see a return to more typical, early-winter weather, and the Prairies could even see a return to colder-than-normal temperatures at times.

Meanwhile, Eastern Canada is expected to see more changeable temperatures as the Arctic air will attempt to spread east, but it will clash with much milder air surging in from the south.

Here is the pattern that we what we expect during mid- and late-December.

This pattern change should produce a more active storm track across Eastern Canada with storms that have the potential to deliver heavy snow to parts of the region. However, they will also bring a risk for ice and rain, especially for southern areas.

Will these storms impact travel plans for the holidays? Or will they wash away our dreams of a white Christmas? Unfortunately, it is much too early to know the exact storm track for systems three weeks ahead of time.

So, it appears that a white versus green Christmas will come down to the weather during the final days leading up to Dec. 25 for much of Southern Canada. However, we are confident that there will be a lot more snow leading up to the holidays than we saw last year, and a white Christmas will be much more widespread across Canada.

Stay tuned to The Weather Network for the latest forecast updates across Canada as we progress through the month of December.

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