Winnipeggers fear the freeze, frozen pipes

Winnipeggers woke up to an extremely cold morning that led to a spike in calls to CAA.

"I'm kind of afraid that this winter will be as cold as the last one," said Winnipegger Joanne Slugocki.

CAA Spokeswoman Angèle Young said the amount of calls was up about 40 per cent over the normal amount for this time of year.

Most of the calls Wednesday were for battery boosts or lock outs — from people who started their cars to warm them up but then locked themselves out of the vehicles.

Matthew Lawrence's home was among the thousands affected by frozen pipes last winter. His pipes didn't thaw until May 31.

Lawrence said Wednesday's cold weather likely sent a lot of Winnipeggers a worrisome reminder of last winter's pipe freezing issues.

"There's got to be a lot of people who are worried right now," he said.

"We're going to be wasting a lot of water in this city this winter, I'm guessing, because there's going to be thousands and thousands of people who are already running their taps."

More cold to come

In many parts of Manitoba it felt at 8 a.m. like the dead of winter, not the beginning of it.

The temperature in Winnipeg was –​29 C but felt like –39 with the wind chill. At 10:30 a.m. it was still –24 C but felt like –35, and it wasn't expected to get a whole lot warmer.

The forecast is for more cold Wednesday night in Winnipeg with an expected low of –​30 C but the winds will be lighter so that means improved wind chill values.

Winnipeg's weather warms up to –13 C on Thursday but that high is still well below the normal daytime high temperature of –6 C for this time of year.

A system bringing snow could leave three to four centimetres in Winnipeg by Saturday morning, according to meteorologist John Sauder.