As my assignment for this project I have chosen to work with Newfoundland and the climate and weather in the area and how that affects the people living there.

Newfoundland is situated on the east coast of Canada. This means that the area is the most maritime one of all the Atlantic provinces. Newfoundland has a long coast line towards the Atlantic ocean and there are very few physical barriers to protect the province from all the weather systems sweeping across it. This makes the province very vulnerable to different weather conditions. This is what Newfoundlanders have faced through hundreds of years and it is also a central part of E. Annie Proulx novel The Shipping News.

In Newfoundland no place is further than 100 km away from the sea, so every part of the island is subject to encircling cold waters.
Many of the storms that cross North America during the year from west to east, or develop and intensify off the East Coast of the United States, pass near the island while they move out to the North Atlantic.
The result is that Newfoundland has a deserved reputation as one of the stormiest parts of the continent. It also has some of the most variable weather anywhere. At all times of the year Newfoundland is near one of the principal storm tracks. The severity and frequency of storms is greatest between November and March, although they may occur at any time of the year. Winter cyclones are fast-moving storms (up to 80 km/h) that bring abundant and varied precipitation.
They pose a serious threat to fishermen, commercial shipping, and offshore oil and gas exploration activities.
This is why many say that To know Newfoundland is to know the sea.
Read more the Newfoundland climate here

Since Newfoundland is so close to the sea, the sea and it`s environment has always been an important part of the livelihood of the Newfoundlanders. There are several links in the book to fishing and the dangers they are exposed to when operating the sea.
On page 221 ( chapter 27 ) Nutbeem tells Quoyle about the faith of the Buggit`s. Jack Buggit has lost his father, grandfather, two brothers, his oldest son and also nearly his youngest son to the sea. The story of how Dennis Buggit survived the horrible accident on the Polar Grinder is also presented to Qouyle by the harbormaster Diddy Shovel ( ch.9, p.84 ). The Polar Grinder`s steel hullcracked amidships under the weight of that wave, a crack almost an inch wide running from starboard to port. …………. The heavy seas and the tons of water pouring in knocked the ship down. She seemed she was about to og and the captain gave the “abandon ship”. If you can imagine those small lifeboats in those seas!
They lost twenty-seven men!

Quoyle himself is also lucky to escape death after capsizing with his boat trying to notify the RMCP station when he finds a dead man floating in the sea. ( ch.26 p 209-212 ).
The Newfoundland and Labrador Drowning report, released in 1996 also told that more than half of the water-related deaths in the period 1991-94 were boating incidents. The most usual accidents were capsizing, swamping and falling over board. This was often instigated by rough water and high winds.
To read more about this numbers and the dangers at sea go here

I believe Billy Pretty tells the tale of a Newfoundlander`s fate in his remembrance speech to Jack Buggit: You all know we are only passing by. We only walk over these stones a few times, our boats float a little while and then they have to sink. The water is a dark flower and a fisherman is a bee in the heart of her. ( ch. 39, p. 332 ).

But not only the sea can be dangerous. The wind also from time to time is a problem for the Newfoundlanders. We see an example of this on page 320, when Qouyle`s house out on the point actually just blows away.

There is also a reference in the book to a few accidents from real life as well, that are quite famous and has happened in the area, all caused by the climate and weather.
One reference is on page 167 where Billy Pretty describes his father`s ship going down in 1909 after hitting an iceberg, just the same thing that happened to the Titanic, 700km southeast of Newfoundland only three years later.
A second reference is on page 194, where Wavey tells about how her husband Herold Prowse died in an oil-rig accident at sea. Proulx uses a different name for the rig, and a different date, but I guess that she refers to the Ocean Ranger Disaster on February 15th 1982 where bad weather caused the sinking of the largest semi-submersible drilling rig in the world, 300 km east of Newfoundland. In total, 84 people died in the world's second worst disaster involving an offshore drill ship. Winds of 145 km/h, waves of 21 metres and high seas hampered rescue efforts.
To read more about special weather events in the Newfoundland area go here