'A pretty amazing phenomenon': Giant ice shoves form on Lake Winnipeg
'A pretty amazing phenomenon': Giant ice shoves form on Lake Winnipeg
'A pretty amazing phenomenon': Giant ice shoves form on Lake Winnipeg
Even though it is spring, some Manitobans were in for a cool surprise over the weekend as ice piled up on the shore of Lake Winnipeg, creating what looked like giant hills of ice.
Ron Suzuki, who lives in Winnipeg Beach, said he drove out to Riverton, Man., on Friday evening and saw the ice piled up about 25 feet high.
Ice shoves on the shore of Lake Winnipeg. (Source Ron Suzuki)
“It was all along this one spit, it’s called Sandy Bar Beach…the ice was pushed up against that whole area,” he said in an interview on Tuesday. “It even pushed sand and dirt up to it as well.”
As for what caused the ice pile up, Alex Crawford, a research associate and sessional instructor at the U of M’s Centre for Earth Observation Science, said this is a classic “ice shove.”
Crawford explained that ice shoves most commonly occur in the spring and involve a mobile ice cover and a persistent wind.
An ice shove on Lake Winnipeg. (Source: Kirby and Celina Russell)
“For the ice cover to be mobile, it needs to be floating on the water. If it's too thick, it might grind on the lake bed and not move easily,” he said in a statement.
Crawford added that mobile ice packs are more common in the spring melt season, because in the fall the ice grows from the shore, but in the spring the melting typically occurs around the shoreline before the centre of the lake.
To then drive the mobile ice cover onto the shore and create an ice shove, it takes a strong, persistent wind.
“These winds blew all that ice onshore, pushing it up relentlessly into those piles,” Crawford said.
“The wind acted like a conveyor belt at a grocery store with nobody bagging, and the ice floes were like the groceries. If the conveyor belt keeps pushing more groceries to the bagging area, they will start piling up at the end.
Other factors, such as water fluctuations, can also contribute to ice shoves.
Suzuki said that he’s seen ice shoves once before in Winnipeg Beach in April 2010.
“It’s a pretty amazing phenomenon,” he said. “I think it’s pretty unique. You need a really big lake.”
The ice shove on the shore of Lake Winnipeg. (Source: Ron Suzuki)
A gunman on a rooftop opened fire on an Independence Day parade in suburban Chicago on Monday, killing at least six people, wounding at least 30 and sending hundreds of marchers, parents with strollers and children on bicycles fleeing in terror, police said. The suspect remained on the loose hours later as authorities scoured the area.
Former Saskatchewan premier Brad Wall was in contact with a key organizer of the Freedom Convoy anti-mandate protest, providing strategic advice before and after the Ottawa occupation began, according to court records obtained by CTV News.
A 41-year-old man will be charged with kidnapping and rape after an Edmonton girl who was missing for more than a week was found, Oregon City Police said.
COVID-19 cases are rising again in Canada, with the two fast-spreading Omicron sub-variants known as BA.4 and BA.5 to blame. CTVNews.ca has a guide to what you need to know about the new variants.
The federal government says it has signed a $20-billion final settlement agreement to compensate First Nations children and families harmed by chronic underfunding of child welfare.
More witnesses are coming forward with new details on the Jan. 6 U.S. Capitol riot following former White House aide Cassidy Hutchinson's devastating testimony last week against former U.S. President Donald Trump, says a member of a U.S. House committee investigating the insurrection.
The family of an Ottawa man killed in a Canada Day crash in the west end says Tom Bergeron died exactly as he lived: selflessly thinking of others before himself.
Former Saskatchewan premier Brad Wall was in contact with a key organizer of the Freedom Convoy anti-mandate protest, providing strategic advice before and after the Ottawa occupation began, according to court records obtained by CTV News.
Former Saskatchewan premier Brad Wall was in contact with a key organizer of the Freedom Convoy anti-mandate protest, providing strategic advice before and after the Ottawa occupation began, according to court records obtained by CTV News.
A former employee at the Rexall Pharmacy on Bancroft Drive in Sudbury pleaded guilty Monday to writing fake fentanyl prescriptions worth more than $1.5 million.
A 41-year-old man will be charged with kidnapping and rape after an Edmonton girl who was missing for more than a week was found, Oregon City Police said.
Two “serious instances” involving people endangering crops to take selfies at a southern Ontario canola farm over the Canada Day long weekend have prompted police to warn the public about the potential consequences of trespassing into crop fields.
Hanna Kovalenko was leading a comfortable lifestyle with her husband and two little girls in Mariupol, Ukraine, when all of a sudden her hometown became the epicentre of a full-scale war.
More than dozen fire trucks from municipalities across Montreal's South Shore are battling a major fire at an industrial produce building in the Monteregie on Monday morning.
Former Saskatchewan premier Brad Wall was in contact with a key organizer of the Freedom Convoy anti-mandate protest, providing strategic advice before and after the Ottawa occupation began, according to court records obtained by CTV News.
The CAT ferry, which sails between Yarmouth, N.S., and Bar Harbour, Maine, has sold more than 20,000 tickets so far this year, that’s up from the 15,100 tickets sold as of June 7.
Over 90,000 Prince Edward Island residents will see a top-up in their bank accounts to help alleviate the pressure of record inflation rates affecting the cost of living in the province.
Cannabis shops cropped up quickly across Waterloo region, but it seems some are now closing shop shortly after they arrived. At least one expert says the shift could point to signs of saturation as the heavily competitive fight for cannabis sales takes its toll.
A Puslinch, Ont. woman says her driveway will need to be repaved less than month after she came home to find strangers working on it without her prior consent.
The Victoria Police Department says two officers needed to "leap" out of the way of a large pickup truck after the driver tried to flee from them on Friday.
The mayor of Langford, B.C., and the city's retired fire chief are back in Canada after making a journey to Ukraine to provide humanitarian aid to people suffering amid the ongoing Russian invasion.
Researchers in Washington state are sounding the alarm over the health of the southern resident killer whale population, saying at least 13 of the orcas appear to be in poor condition.
Ice shoves on the shore of Lake Winnipeg. (Source Ron Suzuki)
An ice shove on Lake Winnipeg. (Source: Kirby and Celina Russell)
The ice shove on the shore of Lake Winnipeg. (Source: Ron Suzuki)
