Here's something I've never thought about before. Extreme cold warnings in Canada vary depending in where you are. For that matter, so do extreme heat warnings, fog warnings, etc. And, when you think about it, it makes perfect sense.
An extreme cold warning is issued by Environment Canada for Toronto and the rest of Southern Ontatio when the temperature (including wind chill effect) is forecast to hit -30°C for at least 2 hours. In Ottawa, which typically has slightly colder winter weather, the cut-off temperature is -35°C . In Montreal, it's -38°C, and in Northen Ontario and most of the Prairies, it's a frigid -40°C. When you get up to the Yukon, nothing happens until the temperature gets down to -50°C, and in Nunavut, an almost inconceivable -55°C!
So, is this just because Toronto is a spoilt enclave of wimps and milquetoasts? Well, perhaps. But the main reason is that people in southern and more temperate regions are just not used to extremes, and may not have the clothing or the experience to deal with occasional colder temperatures. Another way of looking at it is that announcing extreme weather when the temperature falls to -30°C in Nunavut would just be inappropriate, because that would necessitate a warning most days during the winter, and people would just tune out and ignore it.
By the same token, though, Toronto is slower to issue extreme heat warnings than many other areas of the country, and fog has to be forecast for at least eighteen hours in notoriously foggy Atlantic Canada (compared to just six hours elsewhere). It all depends on what you're used to.
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