Weather Word of the Week: Alberta Clipper [Video]

During the winter months, you might hear the First Alert Weather Team say there’s an “Alberta Clipper” on the way. The name might sound menacing, but the bite from those systems is more so from their cold, and less from their snow.

“Alberta Clippers” are named for the region in which they typically develop, and old clipper ships of the 1800s that were the fastest ships of their time. The storm systems develop just east of the Canadian Rockies, then quickly dive southeastward across the Great Plains and into the Great Lakes or Ohio Valley.

Their rapid forward speed often leads to winds gusting 30-50 mph, and a noticeable drop in temperature behind the storm. When you combine those two factors, wind chills are often biting when a clipper comes through.

Alberta Clippers usually race from the Rockies to the Atlantic Ocean in two to three days, and the combination …