Blown away

On Thursday evening, Labrador was visited by a “hard blow”. On Friday, Labrador is being visited by a blowhard.

Badump-chink!

But, seriously… As Peter Cowan reported for CBC Radio Noon today (.ram audio file):

There wasn’t much warning at all. the first wind warning that came out was at about just before seven o’clock, Labrador Time, because they were calling for gusts of up to about 70 kilometres an hour, it was what the forecasts were, but, in fact, those warnings really didn’t come out until we were already seeing 85-kmh winds, 90-kmh winds, with those big gusts that we’ve been talking about. So people here are sorta wondering why there wasn’t any sort of warning, that these sorts of really strong winds were gonna be coming.

In fact, at six p.m., the hourly obs at Goose Bay had already recorded sustained winds of 87 kmh, gusting to 111.

Wasn’t this sort of thing supposed to end with the relocation of the met office back to Gander?

As then-opposition provincial fisheries critic Trevor Taylor said in a March a 14, 2003 press release:

“I am particularly concerned about how the movement of weather forecasting from Gander to Halifax will affect the quality of forecasting and how that may cause problems for the traveling public and for mariners… It would appear that our climate and our location on the ocean would make us the practical location for weather forecasting in eastern Canada.”

And of course, everyone knows that the forecast quality declined after the Gander staff were moved to Halifax. As the great Bill Rowe wrote in a July 2005 column for The Telegram:

Is there a person among us who truly thinks our weather forecasting out here in the North Atlantic Ocean is anywhere near as accurate as before it was pilfered from Gander with the con that Nova Scotia’s high tech would keep it just as good? … The capital city of this province, St. John’s, and indeed the province as a whole, is viewed by much of Canada, and especially by the faceless power brokers of Ottawa, as nothing but a pimple on the arse of Halifax. And that is precisely how we are treated.

Cliff Wells reported in the Western Star the following month:

Jack Harris, a fisherman in Jeffrey’s in Bay St. George South, said the forecast has gotten much worse since the centre moved.

“In my opinion, it (Gander Weather Centre) should never have been moved,” said Harris. “Once this year, we were out fishing and got caught in one of the worst storms we had this summer. The forecast for this area called for 15-20 miles an hour of wind and we had about 50, or 60 miles an hour.”

In September of that year, Leona Gillette of the Newfoundland and Labrador Federation of Municipalities told the same paper:

“This isn’t just a Gander problem, this is a provincial problem… The government should certainly have another look at it. Statistics are showing now that our forecasts were off so many times last winter. There’s been numerous stories of people being caught on the highways in a storm that was never forecasted. That’s dangerous and we could certainly make a fuss over that.”

The lack of accuracy in the Halifax forecast, and the inherent superiority of Gander, was an article of faith in Newfoundland during the Meteorological Interregnum. It was rarely questioned in public, although the Western Star editorial of April 12, 2006 did concede:

There is no scientific evidence to back it up but there has been lots of complaining about the poor quality of weather forecasting in this province since the change was made.

Last fall around this time, the Gander Beacon interview Blair Sparkes of Environment Canada:

As for more accurate and efficient forecasting, Sparkes said the office will be using the same technology as other locations. However, the difference will be, when the public calls the 1-900 phone service, responses will be given from local forecasters rather than from staff in Quebec.

“Plus, if you’re here in the region, over time you get a better feel for the local weather because you’re experiencing it yourself,” he said. “Certainly, the weather (forecasts) for Gander should be better because you can look out the window and see it yourself. From that point of view, there is an expectation that we should be able to improve things locally.”

In other words: having a weather forecaster near where you are is a bonus, because he or she is physically well-situated to tell you what the weather will be like an hour ago.

Kinda like what happened last night when a wind warning was issued an hour after the trees started disengaging from their roots.

Never mind the scientific facts, though, Randy Simms is convinced the weather itself, not just the forecasting thereof, has improved since last April, and he works for the Ministry of Truth (provincial).

(Of course, the whole debate over the forecast accuracy sounds like perfect subject-matter for the Harris Centre for the Study and Promulgation of Newfoundland Nationalist Mythology to delve into and pronounce upon. They could start with Leona Gillette’s “statistics.”)

When the forecast office was moved back to Gander in 2006, the Prime Minister said:

For years now, this province has had to endure inaccurate weather forecasts from nearly a thousand [sic] kilometres away in the Maritimes.

Newfoundlanders and Labradorians* deserve better than to be told to expect five centimetres of snow over night only to wake up to ten times that amount.

In short, Newfoundlanders and Labradorians* deserve accurate forecasts that reflect the reality of the province’s unique weather.

Of course, we all know how so very far Halifax and Montreal are from Newfoundland. And never mind the exact figure, the whole weather office debate have never worried much about facts, anyway. They are far away from Newfoundland. Gander is not. The end. La la la, thumbs in ears, I. CAN’T. HEAR. YOU.

And the distance from Halifax to Newfoundland surely means Gander is too far from most of Labrador to forecast its weather... right?

It would also mean that Environment Canada has to pepper forecasting officers in the centre of overlapping 500-km radius circles across the country, in order to bring the system up to the “accuracy” level of Gander.

Meanwhile, Our Dear Premier will no doubt be diverting from his campaign itinerary to survey the peeled-off rooves and siding, the downed power lines, the shattered trees, and shifted sand dunes. Standing among the wreckage of century-plus trees in North West River and smashed porch steps in Happy Valley, sharing the pain, he will condemn the federal government for not rushing its Rapid Reaction Battalion in from Bagotville to deal with the situation, and then dramatically announce that the province will “go it alone” on compensation to property owners for the damage.

But if you pick through the debris carefully, among the many other things that were blown away, blown down, and blown apart by the Big Blow of 2007, you should find any remaining pretence that, on the Gander weather office issue, “this is not about federal jobs, this is about public safety.”


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* As delivered and quoted, Harper didn’t actually say the “and Labradorians” part that was either in his speaking notes, or inserted into the press release after the fact.