In Part 1 of our 2020 Year-in-Review we looked at Edmonton's temperatures, and Part 2 looked at temperatures in cities across Canada. Part 3 will be about 2020's Precipitation, and the focus will be on Edmonton, but we will bring in Canadian data for some extra context. We will end things of with Snow in Part 4.
Precipitation Each Month
Looking back at the months of 2020, things were around average for January-March, but then April was bottom-5 driest April at both Blatchford and the Airport. That flipped in May with both stations well above average, and that continued through August. September & October were both below average, November was above, and finally December was another bottom-5 for both stations.
For May, June & July Blatchford recorded 320mm, which was its 5th rainiest May-July since 1880, and the rainiest since 1953. The International recorded 311mm which was its 2nd rainiest since 1961.
For 2020 as a whole Blatchford and the International both ended-up above average. Each year we get about 440mm of combined precipitation (rain + snow) and Blatchford recorded 498.7mm with the International at 513.3mm.
How does that compare to other cities?
Edmonton's 500mm~ish of yearly precipitation is definitely on the low end of things compared to other Canadian cities. In 2020 St. John's was up over 1,500mm, Vancouver & Montréal were over 1,000mm, and Ottawa & Toronto were above 750mm. And those numbers were fairly typical for all of those cities.
Winnipeg and Regina were both below 300mm. Winnipeg's 272mm is its lowest ever recorded, and Regina's 203mm is a bottom-10. Apparently 2020 was actually dry, but also Environment Canada's automated stations for those cities
Calgary's 554mm ranked as its #14, and was the most precipitation it has had since 1965. Its May & December were very High, and June was also well above average:
Edmonton gets most of its yearly precipitation in big storms during May through August.
This chart doesn't work exactly the way that I would like it to, but each spike represents going back 20 years. There is some data missing from 2007~2015 which makes the winters look extra-dry, but the general pattern is always the same.
In comparison to Edmonton, in Montréal and St. John's the precipitation is much more evenly spread throughout the year. And famously-rainy Vancouver is the reverse of Edmonton, with a very busy winter but a very quiet May-August.
Big Storms in Edmonton
"Big" storms is relative, but in 2020 Blatchford had 4 days with Precipitation of 25mm or more. The biggest was May 21st at 35.8mm. If you switch the chart of the International there were 3 25mm storms, with May 21st the biggest again at 39.4mm.
Big Storms Across Canada
In this chart we have a comparison of the 25mm+ storms across the country. A link to the dashboard is here.
- St. John's was the big winner with 14 25mm+ storms, the biggest of which was 58mm on July 15th.
- Montréal had 8, and the biggest was 43.4mm on January 11th.
- Vancouver had 7, with the two biggest just under 35mm in January and November.
- Calgary had 5, including 54mm on June 13th
- Toronto had 3, including 59mm on January 11th.
- Ottawa had 4, including 52.1mm on June 5th.
- Regina & Winnipeg did not record any 25mm+ storms in 2020 (possibly because of measurement error) so they are not included here.
And that brings us to the end of Part 3, and our look at 2020's Precipitation. Calgary was quite high, and Edmonton was a little high, while Winnipeg & Regina were very low, and everywhere else was pretty typical.
In Part 4 we will end our 2020 Year-in-Review with a look at Snow.
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