Yukoners mark Heritage Day by shovelling out

It's a good thing Friday was a holiday for many peoplein Whitehorse there wassnow to shovel. Lots of it.

Residents woke up on Heritage Day to find more snow than usual had fallen overnight.

"I haven't seen this much snow in a while," said Jason Durand, taking a break from shovelling his driveway. "We don't usually get this much in one dump. But it's nice to see."

David Millar, a retired Environment Canada weather specialist in Whitehorse, measured the snow in his driveway shortly after 9 a.m. Seventeen centimetres had fallen almost as much as Whitehorse typically sees in theentire month of February.

"We know we broke the record for today," hesaid. "Depending on how much snow we get for the remainder of the day, we could set the record for the month of February," Millar said.

The average snowfall for the month of February in Whitehorse is 18 centimetres. Environment Canada says the previous record for snowfall onFeb. 23was 7.9 centimetres, set in 1960.

However, Whitehorse does not have an official meteorologist measuring snowfall and tracking historical data.

"There is no one in Whitehorse who is accurately measuring the amount of snow that has fallen on the ground currently," said Millar.

According to Environment Canada meteorologistDoug Lundquist,storms that bring snow toWhitehorse tend tocomemore from the west, butthis one came from the northwest. He says the mountains west of the city usually block the snow.

"It doesn't often happen that we get more than 20 centimetresin one storm, in one day in Whitehorse,"said Lundquist. "That's really uncharted territory."

The forecast was calling for more snow on Saturday in Whitehorse, but not quite as much two centimetres, according to Environment Canada.