April is the windiest month in southern Manitoba, and our region is the tenth windiest area in all of Canada.

Senior Climatologist Dave Phillips says the average prevailing wind tends to be from the south at 19 kilometers per hour. “f you ranked all the cities in Canada from one to one hundred, Winnipeg which is very indicative of what the winds would be in the Red River Valley, it would rank about the tenth windiest city in all of Canada.

Phillips says the strongest recorded wind speed in the southeast was 106 kilometers per hour in 1963, and the longest sustained wind speed lasting an hour or more was nearly 90 kilometers per hour in 1959.

He says, the strongest winds have be reported along the ocean and marine areas, with wind gusts around 130 kilometers per hour. From a prairie point of view, Phillips says our region is not as windy as Swift Current, Estevan and Regina, but windier than Saskatoon, Edmonton and places in the east like Toronto and Ottawa.

"From a wind power point of view, there is some opportunity in the southeast because you do certainly have the wind regime. Also, there doesn't seem to be an off season when it comes to wind."

Phillips notes what most of us already know, that in the Red River Valley, the wind seems to blow pretty steady every month.

"That may be because of the flat prairie, and treeless kind of situation and combined active storms. It brings potential for wind generation energy in that part of Manitoba."

He adds, July is the least windy month of the year.