People dreaming of a white Christmas in Nanaimo will likely be looking at whatever is left over from the city’s last snowfall.
Getting snow on Christmas Day is relatively rare in Nanaimo. In fact, since records have been kept only 9.6 per cent of Christmases have received a dump of snow.
Nanaimo’s snowiest Christmas was in 1937 when 38.1 centimetres fell.
Armel Castellan, Environment Canada meteorologist, is seeing slim prospects for Christmas Day snowfall this year. If snow falls over the holidays, it will likely happen on Boxing Day, but there’s faint hope for those who want Christmas white this year if Mother Nature gets everything properly in alignment, which might happen.
“When we look at what’s actually available, we kind of see a disturbance right on the tail end of Christmas,” Castellan said.
Temperatures Friday and Saturday (Dec. 23-24) will drop below freezing and Christmas Day will also be clear.
“On the end of Sunday there’s a chance of snow because we’re going to be, like, minus-two and then that disturbance is going to come in on the 26th, so right at the end of Sunday you could see some flakes fall,” Castellan said. “I don’t know if it will quite be enough to accumulate, but of many locations on the south coast, you happen to be one that has a chance.”