1998 Ice Storm

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The 1998 Canada Ice Storm was a massive ice storm that struck eastern Canada and Northern New York in January 1998.

Contents

Background

Freezing rain is common during Canadian and Upstate NY winters, generally occurring at the narrow boundary between cold air from the west and moist air from the east. Generally speaking, regular rain falls on the east side of the boundary, and snow on the west side. The Montreal area typically receives freezing rain between 12 to 17 times a year, averaging between 45 and 65 total hours of rain.

The Ice Storm

On January 4, 1998, a freak weather system occurred when a large body of warm moist air coming in from the Gulf of Mexico was forced into higher altitudes by a layer of very cold high pressure air coming in from Labrador. At the same time, an unusual pocket of high pressure over the Atlantic Ocean over Bermuda prevented the system from moving further to the east, as most Canadian storms do. As such, instead of a narrow vertical boundary layer between moist and cold air covering a few hundred square miles and moving rather quickly from west to east, a large horizontal zone of rain over very cold air covered an area roughly bounded by Kingston, Ottawa and Quebec City for over three days until the cold system broke through to the Atlantic. Between January 5 and January 10, 1998, for more than 80 hours freezing rain and drizzle fell over an area of several thousand square miles of Eastern Ontario South-Western Quebec, Northern New York (USA), and Northern Vermont (USA). Further to the west, Southern Ontario received heavy rain, while further east, the Maritimes mostly received heavy snow. Exacerbating the problem was a steep drop in temperature that accompanied the freezing rain.

Prior to the 1998 storm, the last major ice storm to hit Montreal (1986) deposited around 30 to 60 millimetres (1½'' to 2¼'') of ice. However, the 1998 storm left deposits twice that thick, downing power lines all over the region, destroying or damaging most of the trees in Montreal, and leaving streets covered in a thick impassable layer of ice. For further comparison, the amount of freezing rain falling over the affected area in just these three days was double the average annual amount of freezing rain.

Effects

Many power lines broke and over 1000 pylons collapsed under the weight of the ice, leaving more than 4 million people without electricity, most of them in southern Quebec, western New Brunswick and Eastern Ontario. Twenty-five people died, primarily from hypothermia. The bridges and tunnel linking Montréal with the South Shore were closed because of concerns about weight tolerances or ice chunks falling from the superstructures. All power linkages to the island of Montréal were down for several hours, disabling both of the city's water pumping stations. The area south of Montreal (Montérégie) was so affected that the triangle formed by Saint-Hyacinthe, Granby and Saint-Jean-sur-Richelieu was nicknamed le triangle de la noirceur ("Triangle of darkness"). Cities such as Ottawa, Smiths Falls and other Eastern Ontario municipalities declared states of emergency. On January 7, Ontario, Quebec and New Brunswick called on the help of the Canadian Forces, prompting the deployment of more than 15,000 military personnel at the peak of the crisis.

When power was restored, parts of Montreal remained impassable due to large chunks of ice falling from rooftops and endangering pedestrians and motorists; large portions of Old Montreal were cordoned off by police.

Three weeks after the end of the storm proper, there were still 700,000 people without electricity. Estimates of death directly linked to the storm vary from 25 to more than 40 and damage estimates reach around $2 billion Canadian for Quebec alone. Overall estimates are around $4-5 billion US for all the areas affected.

The maple syrup and fruit culture growing regions suffered heavy blows and massive losses in the storm. The loss of electrical power also greatly affected pig and cattle farmers, as they could no longer provide water or adequate ventilation to their barns full of livestock, leading to the death of many animals.

Operation RECUPERATION

With the roads blocked by fallen trees, broken power lines and rivers of ice, emergency vehicles could hardly move. On January 7, the provinces of New Brunswick, Ontario and Quebec requested aid from the Canadian Forces (CF), and Operation RECUPERATION began on January 8. It was the largest deployment of troops ever to serve on Canadian soil in response to a natural disaster, and the largest operational deployment of Canadian military personnel since the Korean War.

CF members from about 200 units across Canada helped provincial and municipal workers clear roads, rescue people and animals trapped by storm wreckage, evacuate the sick, shelter and feed about 100,000 people frozen out of their homes, and ensure that farmers had the generators and fuel required to keep their operations going. Military engineers and technicians worked around the clock with hydro and telephone crews to repair and replace downed transmission towers and utility poles. On January 13, at the request of the Province of Quebec, CF members assumed the powers of peace officers in the most devastated areas around Montréal.

At the height of the crisis, Operation RECUPERATION involved 15,784 deployed personnel (including 3,740 Reservists) from all three CF commands; 10,550 in Quebec, 4,850 in Ontario and 384 in New Brunswick. In addition, 6,200 CF members and DND employees working at their regular jobs provided the logistical support required to sustain the operation.

Millions of trees were brought down by the weight of ice, as well as about 1000 steel electrical pylons (said, in Quebec, to be the most solid in the world) and 25,000 wooden transmission poles. Teams were brought in from places such as Prince Edward Island and Nova Scotia, along with teams from the United States, and the Canadian Forces to help restore power to affected homes in Eastern Ontario and Western Quebec.


External links

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