Canadian festival buys fake snow

The usually frigid Canadian city of Winnipeg - often nicknamed Winterpeg - has been so mild and dry this winter that a popular snow-sculpting competition has been forced to truck in 200 loads of fake flakes for this year's annual event.

Winnipeg has enjoyed its third-mildest January in more than a century, with the average temperature a relatively balmy -10.8 Celsius.

“People refer to Winnipeg as Winterpeg so they expect it to be really cold, but everyone is really happy about the warm weather,” said Emili Bellefleur, spokeswoman for Festival du Voyageur, which includes snow carvings of wolves, bison and cultural symbols around the city of 700 000. With supplies of natural snow skimpy, the festival is trucking in artificially made snow from a winter recreation area, similar to the machine-made snow used on ski hills.