Both a red warning, the highest, and a VMA were issued on Thursday for heavy snowfall combined with strong winds. Several decimeters of snow also fell over the area extending from just south of Härnösand in the north to west of Örnsköldsvik.
"There has also been a lot of drifting and we've had streaks of thunderstorms during the night," says Magdalena Folestad, meteorologist at SMHI.
The measuring station in Aspeå, between Örnsköldsvik and Umeå, registered the largest amounts of snow with a precipitation of 51 centimeters between 7 a.m. on Thursday and 7 a.m. on Friday. At that time, the snow depth there was already 24 centimeters.
Kramfors emergency response coordinator Anton Gustafsson describes an extreme situation where tracked vehicles have been deployed for home care.
"I have reports of snow amounts of somewhere between 90 and 150 centimeters," he tells P4 Västernorrland.
Hospital in emergency mode
Around 1,000 households in the county were left without power. All hospitals went into emergency mode to assess the situation. All train traffic between Sundsvall and Umeå was cancelled.
And in several municipalities, public services will be affected on Friday. For example, the upper secondary school in Härnösand is closed and other schools are conducting distance learning. School transport and bus services are cancelled and in Kramfors, the municipality appealed to parents to keep their children at home if they can.
SMHI now believes that the weather warnings are over. The snowfall will subside on Friday and move westward, and the weekend looks to be relatively calm across the country, except possibly on Gotland.
"This weekend there will be more high pressure and not as much precipitation," says Folestad.
However, where it is cloudless, the temperature can drop to minus double digits.
Snow dumped into the river
At the same time, the situation has been difficult in southern Sweden and in Gothenburg. Västtrafik writes on its website that a large part of public transport is still cancelled. During the morning, checks were made to see how large the snowbanks at the stops had become and how traffic could proceed.
School buses in Uddevalla will not operate and train services between Stenungsund and Gothenburg were cancelled this morning due to the weather.
The snow dumps in Gothenburg are now so full that they have started dumping snow into the river, which is normally not permitted, according to P4 Gothenburg, but the county administrative board has granted an exemption.
SMHI has three levels of weather warnings:
Yellow warning: Consequences for society, some risks to the public.
Orange warning: Serious consequences for society, danger to the public.
Red warning: Very serious consequences for society, great danger to the public.
