'Like driving in a Slurpee': Freezing rain, slushy snow create treacherous roads on Prairies

Road conditions remained treacherous Monday in many areas of Saskatchewan after the weekend's winter storm.

The storm dumped freezing rain and then blowing snow across a wide swath of the province.

Members of a downhill ski group from Regina found themselves in the thick of it as they headed home from Canmore, Alta., on Sunday. Some of them made it home, while others hunkered down in hotels along the way.

Kelly Lucas was one of the last in the group to get on the road Sunday, so he had the benefit of reports from others ahead of him on the road. He and his daughters made it as far as Medicine Hat, Alta., before stopping for the night.

"It was pretty bad. Our conditions after Calgary, about Bassano area, the roads started getting covered and it was super wet, slushy snow. It was like driving in a Slurpee. It was getting worse and worse as we headed west," he said.

At one point before they stopped Sunday, he saw about four vehicles that had gone in the ditch "right in front of us," with the drivers just getting out of their vehicles to survey the situation as he passed by, he said.

Back on the road on Monday morning, Lucas said the highway was still very icy and "terrible."

One of the group members who did make it home to Regina on Sunday night was Dwayne Downton, who had started the trip a few hours before Lucas. But Downton, travelling with his 14-year-old son, hit the ditch along the way, west of Swift Current.

"A big gust of wind had kind of pushed me into the shoulder a little bit and that sucked me right into the ditch," he said. "But luckily where we had hit the ditch, there wasn't a ton of snow in the ditch itself, so we were able to continue moving."

Downton said he was able to get back on the road without having to call for help, and decided to continue on. After another delay at the scene of a crash near Belle Plaine, he made it home.

'Stay in your vehicle'

Sask. RCMP said in a news release Monday afternoon that they received 52 reports of "weather-related motor vehicle collisions and incidents" in the province between 10 a.m. CST Sunday and 10 a.m. CST Monday.

RCMP advised travellers to check the weather and road conditions along their route before travelling and consider delaying travel if conditions are poor.

"If travel is necessary, stay on roads that have recently received road maintenance," RCMP said. "If you find yourself stranded, or in an emergency situation road-side, stay in your vehicle, stay warm and make sure your tailpipe remains clear of snow and ice."

A section of the Trans-Canada Highway west of Swift Current was closed Monday morning after two collisions were reported, one in Swift Current at the intersection of Highway 1 and 11th Avenue Northwest, and another on the highway near Gull Lake, about 50 kilometres west of Swift Current.

Reduced visibility, slush, ice, heavy snow, snow drifts and drifting snow contributed to the poor conditions in that area, and even after the road closure was lifted, travel was still not recommended as of 1 p.m. CST Monday, according to the Saskatchewan Highway Hotline.

Another section of the Trans-Canada Highway in the province, from Wolseley east to the Manitoba border, was also closed Monday morning with slush, ice, loose snow and drifting snow reported, but reopened a few hours later.

Jack-knifed semis were reported on that section of highway, near Broadview at the intersection with Highway 201.

Back into the cold

Due to the rain and heavy, compacted snow, it was hard to get a good measurement of how much fell in the weekend's storm, said Christy Climenhaga, a scientist with Environment and Climate Change Canada.

Areas like Meadow Lake and Saskatoon reported three to four centimetres of snow. Bredenbury, a town just southeast of Yorkton, reported 25 cm of snow.

"An interesting storm to say the least, one where those snowfall totals don't really tell the story of the severity of the weekend weather," Climenhaga said.

Looking ahead, it's going to get colder again.

"We're taking a turn, weather-wise, across Saskatchewan, changing from that precipitation event, seeing that milder weather — that rainfall, if you can believe it at this point in December — into some true, cold winter weather," she said.

Much of the province can expect a "bullseye" of cold weather in the minus-20s and even minus-30s by Wednesday night, before temperatures warm up again into the weekend.