These Are Canada’s Top 10 Weather Events in 2022

Environment and Climate Change Canada has released its Top 10 Weather Stories list for 2022.

Credit: Communications Nova Scotia

This year, Canadians witnessed extreme weather, such as Fiona wallopping Eastern Canada, a derecho, prompting emergency alerts across Ontario and Quebec and spring floods in Manitoba.

Here is a quick look at the top 10 weather events:

Furious Fiona strikes Eastern Canada: Post-tropical Fiona made landfall in eastern Nova Scotia with sustained winds of 165 km/h at hurricane-force pounding Atlantic Canada with heavy rains, powerful winds, storm surges and waves as high as 2 meters causing structural losses and coastal infrastructure damage to wharves, piers and breakwaters and destroying natural landmarks.
Billion-dollar derecho rakes across Ontario and Quebec: The hugely powerful line of storms across central Ontario and Quebec, which resulted in Environment Canada’s first-time-ever immediate severe thunderstorm alert through the National Public Alerting System (Alert Ready), caused high damage leading to 13 communities declaring states of emergency, including the towns of Uxbridge and Clarence-Rockland, east of Ottawa. It also caused more than a million insurance claims, topping one billion dollars in damages, making it the sixth largest in terms of insured losses in Canadian history.
Manitoba’s drenching spring: Southern Manitoba’s third-highest snowfall since 1872 (more than 150 mm of snowfall), together with Winnipeg’s wettest spring (331.4 mm in precipitation) and high amounts of snowfall in April, led to Red River cresting with water levels approaching those of the 2009 flood. Forty-five municipalities and nine First Nation communities across the province declared local states of emergency.
Return to hot and dry weather under the dome: Summer 2022 was the third warmest Canadian summer, almost 1.6°C above normal.
Wildfires on two coasts: While British Columbia’s 2022 wildfire season burned a relatively less area of 1050 km2 compared to the 10-year average of 4232 km2, parts of central Newfoundland experienced the worst wildfires the province had seen in over 60 years.
A wintery spring in British Columbia (without the flood): British Columbia experienced a snowy spring resulting in a mountain snowpack throughout the province at 165% above normal by June 1st.
Super storms track across the Prairies in July: Four powerful and dangerous thunderstorms raked prairies last summer. These include EF-2 tornado with wind speeds between 180 and 190 km/h, which touched down in Bergen, and an EF-2 tornado with maximum wind speeds of 190 km/h passed west of Medicine Hat.
Montreal swamped by humongous rain system: Heavy storms which caused flooding in Montreal led to personal and commercial property losses totalling $166 million. This is the third most expensive extreme weather disaster in 2022 after the Ontario-Quebec derecho and Hurricane Fiona.
Record-breaking cold in time for the holidays: The prairies and the territories experience recording-breaking temperatures ranging from -40 and -55.
Three weekend January storms stress Atlantic Canada: Three different storm systems brought a combination of heavy rainfall, snow and wind. While Sydney, St. John’s, Corner Brook, and Stephenville had their rainiest January on record, Charlottetown experienced its snowiest January.

Environment Canada says changing climate is causing shorter skating seasons, increased frost-free days, longer growing season and more severe and extended wildfire season is reshaping the entire climate landscape.

Insurance costs relating to weather-related events in 2022 are approaching $3 billion as per preliminary estimates compiled by Catastrophe Indices and Quantification Inc. (CatIQ).