STORM UPDATE: No further evacuations Wednesday night; forecast calls for slightly less intense snowfall

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No further evacuations are planned Wednesday night as the worst of a snowstorm hits Longyearbyen, according to The Governor of Svalbard.

“We will follow the development of weather and possible avalanche danger throughout the evening and night,” Gov. Kjerstin Askholt said in a prepared statement.

Officials will assess the situation against at 9:30 a.m. Thursday. The worst of the expected to continue until noon.

The latest decision comes after a revised weather report at 5 p.m. Wednesday predicted predicts somewhat less snowfall between 6 p.m. Wednesday and noon Thursday than the previous forecast (15.2 millimeters of precipitation, down from 15.9mm earlier today). The peak predicted snowfall rate between midnight and 6 a.m. has also been reduced, but winds may be slightly stronger then (94 km/h gusts to 144 km/h in exposed areas).

All of Nybyen was evacuated early this afternoon due to the potential avalanche risk, but officials said they do not expect any snowslides to reach buildings.

About Post Author

Mark Sabbatini

I'm a professional transient living on a tiny Norwegian island next door to the North Pole, where once a week (or thereabouts) I pollute our extreme and pristine environment with paper fishwrappers decorated with seemingly random letters that would cause a thousand monkeys with a thousand typewriters to die of humiliation. Such is the wisdom one acquires after more than 25 years in the world's second-least-respected occupation, much of it roaming the seven continents in search of jazz, unrecognizable street food and escorts I f****d with by insisting they give me the platonic tours of their cities promised in their ads. But it turns out this tiny group of islands known as Svalbard is my True Love and, generous contributions from you willing, I'll keep littering until they dig my body out when my climate-change-deformed apartment collapses or they exile my penniless ass because I'm not even worthy of washing your dirty dishes.

marksabbatini@yahoo.com

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