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Skating on a public ice rink – illustrative photo.
Ottawa – In Canada, this year they will not open the world's largest skating rink, which is created when the eight-kilometer Rideau canal in Ottawa freezes. The temperatures were too mild this winter, local authorities said. The time you can skate on the downtown Ottawa canal has been gradually decreasing over the past decades. This year, however, is the first time that the season will not start at all, AFP reported.
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In order for skating on the canal in the city center to be safe, a layer of ice at least 30 centimeters high must form on it. This requires temperatures to drop to ten to twenty degrees below zero for at least 14 days. However, Ottawa experienced a mild winter this year. The average January temperature in the Canadian city was -5.9 degrees, while in previous years the average temperature dropped to -10.3 degrees.
“Despite all our efforts, the weather has overcome us for the first time in history,” they said. Ottawa authorities. The skating rink started operating about 50 years ago and has become a popular attraction for locals and tourists. It attracted an average of 22,000 people every day, writes AFP. In the 1970s, skating on it usually started at the end of December, in recent years it is more at the end of January. The season is practically half over. In the 1970s, there was an average of 95 days of skating on the canal, now it's around 50.
