Wicked weather collapses Bluesfest stage in Ottawa....
http://www.cbc.ca/gfx/images/news/topstories/2011/07/17/li-620-collapse3-cp997811.jpg
http://ca.news.yahoo.com/festival-watch-weather-more-closely-violent-storm-toppled-152156670.html
OTTAWA - The freak windstorm that toppled the main stage at the Ottawa Bluesfest may be a sign of weather to come, warns a top climatologist.
But one of Canada's foremost weather experts has his own theory: climate change.
Environment Canada senior climatologist Dave Phillips said it's not the days that are getting hotter ? it's the nights.
According to Phillips, there are more and more nights when the mercury stays above 20 Celsius. That means there is less time for the air to cool down at night, causing a build-up of hot air. When a cold front comes in, like it did on Sunday night in the Ottawa region, it's the perfect storm fuel.
"You do get the element of severe weather under something like this, when it's so hot and humid,"
Phillips said.
He said Canadians can expect more of the extreme weather that howled through the concert grounds, sending thousands of people scurrying for cover as scaffolding buckled into a heap.
"This is really just a dress rehearsal of what we will see more likely in the future," Phillips said.
Concertgoer Pamela Cogan, a respiratory therapist, was at the foot of the stage and jumped the barricades after the collapse to see if anyone required assistance. She said it was a "miracle" that nobody died.
"It was like a scene out of 'Armageddon.' Right before the collapse, it was sunny and lovely, and then moments later, dark clouds appeared, and the atmosphere changed. A gust of wind blew confetti from the ground up, the drapes blew inwards, the stage collapsed, and someone yelled, 'Get off,'"
Cogan said.
Cheap Trick manager Dave Frey, who was on stage seconds before the collapse, told Rolling Stone magazine that the driver's leg was broken and the band lost all of its equipment.
