Brace yourself, southern Ontario – we’re trading in the nice and mild temperatures of the past few days for a significant snow storm and chilly weather.

“At this point it looks like the storm will start out as rain across much of southern Ontario later Thursday afternoon,” said Brett Anderson, a senior meteorologist at AccuWeather.

“That’s going to change over to sleet and then snow in the Windsor area right through London into Hamilton late in the day into the evening,” Anderson explained. “The snow is going to reach Toronto probably around 6 or 7 o’clock in the evening.”

The storm will be at its heaviest Thursday night, especially in Hamilton and St. Catharines. That area could see anywhere between 15 to 30cm of snow by Friday morning. As for Toronto, the city can expect 8 to 12 cm of snow.

“Roads will certainly be very slippery for the morning commute and I certainly advise people to leave plenty of extra time heading into work on Friday morning,” said Anderson.





As for the spring-like temperatures we’ve had the past few days, those will be disappearing when the storm hits.

Temperatures are going to be dropping steadily Thursday evening and into Thursday night. At the height of the storm, temperatures will be close to zero, so it’s going to be wet snow, especially in the Hamilton and St. Catherines area through the Niagara region.

“It’s going to come down hard, and it’s going to stick,” warned Anderson. “Conditions are going to be very treacherous and visibility is going to be very low at times. With the wind blowing, we could see some blizzard-like conditions along the QEW.”

The worst of the storm is going to be over by midday Friday, said Anderson.

“Early Saturday morning there might be a bit of snow but conditions should rapidly improve late in the morning and certainly by the afternoon. It looks fairly chilly in the area in the wake of the storm, around 3 Celsius in Toronto. It will be sunny throughout the weekend, but cold.”