Blizzard closes roads across Midwestern Ontario

The road closed signs went up quickly this afternoon across Midwestern Ontario as a blizzard tore across the region.

"Usually we don’t get storms like this, especially the past few years, but it’s back," says Bruce County resident, Tim Stuchara.

Winds pushing 100 kilometres an hour, coupled with constant snowfall, as much as 5 centimetres an hour, is pushing the region into a virtual lockdown. The OPP have closed all roadways, they patrol, in Huron and Perth County. Roadways across Bruce and Grey County are starting to close, as well. It’s so bad, snowplows, in parts of the region, are being pulled off the roadways, because of the treacherous conditions.

Thankfully, schools across the four counties, and across much of Ontario, were pre-emptively closed today, because even if buses would have made it to school this morning, they would have been left stranded there, due to the weather.

A sign closing off the roads at the corner of Highway 86 and Highway 4 in Wingham on Friday, December 23, 2022 (Scott Miller/CTV News London)

As for the power grid, it’s largely withstanding the powerful storm, so far, with pockets of hydro outages stretching from Tobermory to Lucan. Still, any power outage could be life-threatening tonight, as temperatures fall below minus 15.

Which is why so many people were buying generators, leading up to this weekend’s storm.

"Most of the week, we’ve had lots of calls from customers about getting their snow equipment serviced, and ready to go. The push has been for us, to try and have that equipment ready for customers, ready to use," says Jarret Wilken, Parts Manager at Premier Equipment in Listowel.

Many stores sold out of shovels, salts, generators, and snowblowers, leading up to this blizzard, which is expected to peak Friday night, but continue with snowsqualls throughout Saturday and Sunday, for much of Midwestern Ontario.

Snowplows in Wingham in the afternoon of Friday, December 23, 2022 (Scott Miller/CTV News London)

"Going to dress warm, and have faith we’ll get to where we’re going today. What can you do. It’s Bruce County and Huron County in the winter," says Walter Moses, as he stopped for gas in Wingham, amidst the storm.

Complicating matters this weekend, the temporary closure of three area emergency departments. The ER in Walkerton will be closed Christmas Eve night. Wingham’s ER is closed Christmas Day night, while Chesley’s Emergency Department, closed Friday night, and will not reopen until Tuesday morning. The weather playing a role in the some of the closures, limiting out of town nurses' ability to make it to the rural hospitals. 

 

Current road conditions in Huron, Bruce and Lambton counties

The blast of winter is wreaking havoc on the Great Lakes area of the province,  with all roads closed in Bruce County being closed by OPP late Friday afternoon. Snowplows have also been pulled from the roads in Bruce County as well.

Earlier in the afternoon, OPP West Region tweeted out that in the interest of public safety, "all main roadways" in Huron County are currently closed due to the winter storm.

In addition, OPP said that Highway 21 between Goderich and Grand Bend is currently closed due to the adverse weather.

OPP also said Highway 9 between Kincardine and Walkerton is closed due to poor driving conditions.

Highway 8 between Clinton and Seaforth is also closed. 

On Friday afternoon, the Township of Huron-Kinloss announced that due to the storm, snow plows were being removed from service and its fire department was only provding "limited service" for the time being. 

"Huron-Kinloss Fire & Emergency Service will continue to make every reasonable attempt to respond to emergencies that are deemed a serious threat to life," reads a press release. "All other responses will be evaluated based on risk vs. reward and an appropriate response determination will be made by the Fire Chief, District Chiefs or Officer in Charge." 

" It is not worth taking a chance on the roads today," OPP wrote on Twitter.

— With files from CTV News London's Ashley Hyshka