Extreme cold prompts school, bus cancellations in parts of southern Manitoba

Posted on February 18, 2025 by Peggy

The bitterly cold temperatures that have enveloped southern Manitoba have forced some schools to cancel classes for Tuesday, and others to cancel bus service.

All classes are cancelled for the day in the Fort La Bosse School Division, while schools are open but buses are not operating in the Beautiful Plains and Rolling River divisions.

The following schools are closed in the Franco-Manitoban School Division:

École Saint-Lazare.
École La Source (Shilo).
École régionale Notre-Dame (Notre Dame de Lourdes).
École Jours de Plaine (Laurier).

The Brandon School Division is not running any buses to schools outside of the city but all schools are open. Buses are operating within the city limits. Attendance at schools is at parental discretion where travel is required.

Wind chill values of –40 to near –50 are occurring in southern Manitoba, which is under an extreme cold warning from Environment Canada.

Those warnings are expected to remain in place over the next few days. Wind chill values may moderate slightly during the daytime but are expected to return to extreme levels again at night and in the mornings, according to Environment Canada.

Temperatures are forecasted to moderate by Thursday with a significant warm-up by the weekend and into the next week.

Normal temperatures for this time of year are a high of –7 C and overnight low of –17 C. The forecast for Winnipeg is calling for highs of –4 C by the end of the week and –1 C to start the next week.

In the meantime, the high for Tuesday is expected to be –20 C.