The man who trades freedom for security does not deserve nor will he ever receive either. – Benjamin Franklin
– Romanian-Bulgarian border closed due to heavy snow (Romania Business Insider, Jan. 26, 2012):
The border between Romania and Bulgaria was closed due to the bad weather conditions, according to the Bulgarian Regional Development Minister Lilyana Pavlova, quoted by Novinite.com.
The Giugiu-Bucharest border crossing is closed for all vehicles due to the heavy snow. All transit traffic from Greece and Turkey via Bulgaria to Romania has also been stopped, Lilyana Pavlova added.
– Snow falling in South Island (New Zealand Herald, Jan. 22, 2012):
Mid-Summer snow is falling and settling on Porters Pass this afternoon in the South Island, along with hail and other winter conditions on Arthurs Pass reports WeatherWatch.co.nz.
WeatherWatch.co.nz’s West Coast reporter, Andy Thompson, says traffic is heavier than usual and describes the current weather conditions as “completely winter-like”.
Reports coming in from Southland to Canterbury talk of people lighting fires, turning on heaters and heat pumps and generally saying it feels like the middle of winter.
YouTube Added: 19.01.2012
– Storm brings snow to Sahara Desert (9News, Jan. 18, 2012):
BECHAR, Algeria – Snow fell Tuesday in the Sahara Desert in western Algeria.
A 24-hour cold spell brought snow and rain to the region.
Jan 17 – A freak storm hits northern Japan’s Hokkaido island, bringing with it the heaviest snowfall on record for the region. Travis Brecher reports.
A resident in Ischgl, Austria, contemplates the enormous task of clearing the snow from his roof
More pictures and video here:
– European ski resorts in ‘lockdown’ after freak snowfalls cut road, rail and air links (Daily Mail, Jan. 11, 2012):
Many have become stranded since the weekend because of the heaviest snowfalls in Alps in the past 30 years.
– Snowed in! British skiers stranded in resorts across Europe after record snow dump (Daily Mail, Jan. 11, 2012):
Thousands of British skiers are said to be stranded across Europe after heavy snowfall trapped them in their ski resorts.
Austria, southern German, France and Switzerland have seen freak snowfalls dumping up to 18ft of snow and blocking roads and railways.
Read moreSnow Chaos: Heaviest Snowfalls In Alps In 30 years – European Ski Resorts In ‘Lockdown’
– Anchorage on track for snowiest winter on record (San Jose Mercury News, Jan. 12, 2012):
ANCHORAGE, Alaska — Weary Alaskans woke up to another big dump of snow on Thursday, adding to what already has been the snowiest period on record in Anchorage and causing more headaches in coastal areas struggling to dig out.
The snow started falling shortly before midnight, and meteorologists warned Anchorage residents the heaviest snowfall — up to 16 inches — could come later Thursday.
About 150 miles to the southeast, the Prince William Sound community of Cordova, which has already been buried under 172 inches of snow since November, could get another 7 inches Thursday, meteorologist Shaun Baines said. The picturesque fishing community has had so much snow, National Guard troops helping clear roads are running out of shovels.
Read moreAlaska: Anchorage On Track For Snowiest Winter On Record
Setting 3 new records! And the season has just started!
– RECORD EVENT REPORT NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE MIDLAND/ODESSA TX (Jan. 10, 2012):
RECORD EVENT REPORT
NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE MIDLAND/ODESSA TX
250 AM CST TUE JAN 10 2012
..RECORD DAILY MAXIMUM PRECIPITATION SET AT MIDLANDA RECORD DAILY MAXIMUM PRECIPITATION OF 0.70 INCHES WAS RECORDED ON
MONDAY JANUARY 9TH 2012 AT MIDLAND. THIS BREAKS THE OLD DAILY
RECORD OF 0.33 SET IN 1955.
..RECORD DAILY MAXIMUM SNOWFALL SET AT MIDLANDA RECORD DAILY SNOWFALL OF 10.6 INCHES WAS RECORDED ON MONDAY
JANUARY 9TH 2012 AT MIDLAND. THIS BREAKS THE OLD RECORD OF 5.9 SET
IN 1955. THIS IS ALSO NOW THE GREATEST DAILY SNOWFALL ON
RECORD…BREAKING THE OLD GREATEST DAILY SNOWFALL ON RECORD OF 9.8
INCHES SET ON DECEMBER 11 1998.
..RECORD SEASONAL SNOWFALL SET AT MIDLAND19.5 OF SNOW HAS FALLEN DURING THE 2011-2012 SEASON AT MIDLAND AS OF
JANUARY 9TH 2012. THIS BREAKS THE OLD RECORD OF 13.9 INCHES SET IN
1946-47.
– 0.27 microSv/h from snow in Saint Louis (Fukushima Diary, Jan. 12, 2012):
They measured 0.27 microSv/h (0.027 mR/h) from the first snow in Saint Louis .
In case it contains Cs-137, it may be 746 Bq/Kg roughly calculating.
The recorder states like this below:
Typically it is difficult to measure the radioactivity of snow because its water content tends to attenuate the measurements;. However, one interesting effect we have noticed is that during active snowfalls indoor atmospheric radioactive readings tend to elevate above 2x background radiation.
They measured 0.27 microSv/h (0.027 mR/h) from the first snow in Saint Louis .
In case it contains Cs-137, it may be 746 Bq/Kg roughly calculating.
The recorder states like this below:
Typically it is difficult to measure the radioactivity of snow because its water content tends to attenuate the measurements;. However, one interesting effect we have noticed is that during active snowfalls indoor atmospheric radioactive readings tend to elevate above 2x background radiation.
First 2012 RADIOACTIVE SNOW!!!
YouTube Added: 12.01.2012
More info:
Read moreSaint Louis: Radioactive Snow At 0.27 Microsieverts/Hour (Jan. 2012 – Video)
– Upper Midwest Snowstorm’s History of Breaking Records (Accu Weather, Nov. 19, 2011):
The snowstorm invading and disrupting travel across the Upper Midwest this has a history of shattering records farther to the west.
As of 1:30 p.m. CST, a foot of snow had buried places in western South Dakota.
– Snowstorm pelts East Coast, cuts power to more than 2M (USA Today, Oct. 30, 2011):
STATE COLLEGE, Pa. (AP) – A snowstorm with a ferocity more familiar in February than October socked the Northeast over the weekend, knocking out power to 2.3 million, snarling air and highway travel and dumping more than 2 feet of snow in a few spots as it slowly moved north out of New England. Officials warned it could be days before many see electricity restored.
The combination of heavy, wet snow, leaf-laden trees and frigid, gusting winds brought down limbs and power lines. At least three deaths were blamed on the weather, and states of emergency were declared in New Jersey, Connecticut, Massachusetts and parts of New York.
“If you are without power, you should expect to be without power for a prolonged period of time,” Connecticut Gov. Dannel P. Malloy said Saturday night.
The storm worsened as it moved north, and communities in western Massachusetts were among the hardest hit. Snowfall totals topped 27 inches in Plainfield, and nearby Windsor had gotten 26 inches by early Sunday.
Bayron Zamora, right, 15, and Jarell Finley, 17, look at a down tree as heavy snow created issues with down lines and trees during a rare October snowstorm that hit the Northern New Jersey region, Saturday, Oct. 29, 2011, in Lodi, N.J. (AP)
– Early snow pelts East Coast, cuts power to 1.7M (AP, Oct. 29, 2011):
STATE COLLEGE, Pa. (AP) — An unusually early and powerful nor’easter dumped wet, heavy snow Saturday on parts of the mid-Atlantic region, weighing down or toppling leafy trees and power lines and knocking out electricity for 1.7 million as the storm headed toward New England.
Communities inland were getting hit hardest, with eastern Pennsylvania serving as the bull’s-eye for the storm, said National Weather Service spokesman Chris Vaccaro. Some places got more than half a foot of snow, and towns near the Maryland-Pennsylvania border saw 10 inches fall. And New York City’s Central Park set a record for both the date and the month of October with 1.3 inches of snow by midafternoon and more falling.
More than 1.7 million customers lost power from Maryland north through Massachusetts, and utilities were bringing in crews from other states to help restore it. Half a million in New Jersey were without power, including Gov. Chris Christie, and almost as many were in the dark in Connecticut and Pennsylvania. Both New Jersey and Connecticut declared states of emergencies.
The European winter is not letting up. In Spain heavy snow forced a motorway north of Madrid to close, trapping thousands of drivers for several hours overnight on Friday into Saturday.
Snowploughs were unable to reach the scene on the A-6 because cars blocked the route.
The road was re-opened later but drivers were warned to stay at home unless their trip was absolutely necessary.
05/03 18:19 CET
Source: EuroNews
No matter what happens the warmist fraudsters will always claim that everything is happening because of man-made global warming.
Even this? 70 Trillion Cubic Feet of NEW ARTIC ICE
There is no global warming and there certainly never was a man-made global warming and CO2 has nothing do to with a warming climate, because rising CO2 levels always lag 800 years behind rising temperatures.
You can even see that relation also in Al GWhore’s fake hockey stick graph.
Science has become totally unscientific:
– On The Current State Of Climate Science: Unequivocal Equivocation – An Open Letter To Dr. Trenberth
These are YOUR man-made global warming experts:
The elitists seem to know exactly what is really going on:
– Global Cooling and the New World Order (Telegraph):
“The 58th Bilderberg Meeting will be held in Sitges, Spain 3 – 6 June 2010. The Conference will deal mainly with Financial Reform, Security, Cyber Technology, Energy, Pakistan, Afghanistan, World Food Problem, Global Cooling, Social Networking, Medical Science, EU-US relations.”
Yep, that’s right. Global Cooling.
The elitists may have just intentionally caused a mini Ice Age:
– Life on this Earth Just Changed: The North Atlantic Current is Gone
– 30 Facts – The Rothschild Bankers Planned The Gulf Disaster
– Jesse Ventura Conspiracy Theory: ‘Gulf Coast Oil Spill’
The bottom line is always money, power and control and not the truth.
(Click on images to enlarge.)
A new satellite map by the government agency NOAA shows the extent of the snow blanketing a vast area from the west coast of Canada to eastern China
At first glance it looks like a graphic from a Discovery Channel programme about a distant ice age. But this astonishing picture shows the world as it is today – with half the Northern Hemisphere covered with snow and ice.
The image was released by the National Oceanic And Atmospheric Association (NOAA) on the day half of North America was in the grip of a severe winter storm.
The map was created using multiple satellites from government agencies and the US Air Force.
That Antarctica, the Arctic, Greenland and the frozen wastes of Siberia are covered in white comes as no surprise. But it is the extent to which the line dips down over the Northern Hemisphere that is so remarkable about the image.
The shroud of white stretches down from Alaska and sweeps through the Midwest and along to the Eastern seaboard. The bitter cold has reached as far as Texas and northern Mexico where in Ciudad Juarez temperatures today were expected to dip to minus 15C.
In the U.S. tens of millions of people chose to stay at home rather than venture out. In Chicago, 20in of snow fell leading to authorities closing schools for the first time in 12 years. The newspaper for Tulsa, Okalahoma, was unable to publish its print edition for the first time in more than a century.
This particular storm is the result from two clashing air masses which, if not unprecedented, is extraordinarily rare for its size and ferocious strength.
‘A storm that produces a swath of 20in snow is really something we’d see once every 50 years – maybe,’ said a U.S. National Weather Service meteorologist.
Hundreds of drivers on Lake Shore Drive in Chicago, which was blasted by 20 inches of snow, abandoned their cars in an almost apocalyptic scene as authorities closed the road
Louis Uccellini, director of the government’s National Centers for Environmental Prediction, said the U.S. storm also drew strength from the La Nina condition currently affecting the tropical Pacific Ocean.
La Nina is a periodic cooling of the surface temperatures of the tropical Pacific Ocean, the opposite of the better-known El Nino warming. Both can have significant impacts on weather around the world by changing the movement of winds and high and low pressure systems.
A scene from sci-fi film The Day After Tomorrow? No, these are cars stuck in the northbound lanes of Lake Shore Drive, Chicago, after accidents and drifting snow stranded the drivers during last night’s blizzard. As of late morning more than 20in of snow had fallen, making this snowstorm the third largest recorded in the city
The NOAA image shows how the weather is affecting Scotland and begins in earnest from southern Germany, through Italy and down into Greece, Turkey and Iran. Northern areas of India and China are also affected.
The startling image was released on the same day Al Gore stepped up to defend his claim that global warming causes the bitterly cold weather. Thirty states in America are affected by a two-day blizzard.
Writing in his blog Al’s Journal, he said: ‘As it turns out, the scientific community has been addressing this particular question for some time now and they say that increased heavy snowfalls are completely consistent with what they have been predicting as a consequence of man-made global warming.’
Hilarious! This is what thosefraudsters call ‘completely consistent’:
His response came after Fox News pundit Bill O’Reilly challenged the former Vice President to give his thoughts on ‘why southern New York has turned into the tundra’.
Read moreNOAA Satellite Map Shows Most of Northern Hemisphere is Covered in Snow and Ice
Drifting snow and icy winds brought even the hardiest Midwesterners to their knees Wednesday as two-thirds of the nation reeled from what the National Weather Service described as a storm of “historic proportions.”
Dubbed the “Blizzard of Oz” in Kansas, the storm coursed its way through the Midwest and Plains states — collapsing roofs, forcing highway and school closures, leaving tens of thousands without power and breaking snowfall and low-temperature records.
Airlines canceled about 6,300 flights Wednesday, according to the flight tracking service FlightAware.com. About a third of the canceled flights were out of Chicago’s O’Hare International Airport, one of the nation’s busiest hubs. Eighty-four flights were canceled at Los Angeles International Airport.
At least two deaths were blamed on the weather. On Long Island in New York, a homeless man set himself on fire trying to stay warm, and in Oklahoma a 20-year-old woman was killed while being pulled on a sled by a pickup that crashed into a pole.
By late Wednesday, the blizzard, which pummeled Chicago with lightning, thunder and whiteout conditions, had narrowed its path along northern New England and upstate New York.
At its height, the storm had a following that more than rivaled Oprah Winfrey‘s Twitter audience: the National Weather Service website, which normally gets 70 million hits a day, was drawing as many as 20 million an hour Wednesday.
At one point the weather service issued blizzard warnings for an area stretching from Oklahoma City to Detroit, and wind-chill warnings from the Dakotas to Texas, said Laura Furgione, the service’s deputy director. She compared the “massive storm” to the one that paralyzed Chicago in 1979 for more than a week.
Not only did 20.2 inches of snow and near-hurricane winds close Chicago schools and banks Wednesday, it kept people from so much as buying groceries or fixing an achy tooth. Denise Daly spent the morning canceling appointments at her dental office.
“Someone with a toothache can deal with it for a day as long as they have something for the pain,” she said.
Although the snowfall had all but stopped Wednesday evening, it went down in the books as the third-worst storm in Chicago, and set a record for cold at minus 40 degrees in parts of Montana. Oklahoma City’s 11.8 inches of snow set a new February one-day record.
President Obama received a telephone briefing on the federal response to the storm from Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano and Federal Emergency Management Agency Administrator Craig Fugate. FEMA had put power generators, blankets, cots, water, meals and other emergency supplies in places that were likely to suffer the most.
“It’s been a very snowy winter in general,” Furgione said. “It’s not over yet. We’re still expecting this cold air to remain over the central United States and even the Eastern Seaboard. We are expecting more below-normal temperatures at least through the next two weeks.”
For worried Super Bowl fans, predictions called for warmer temperatures by Sunday in Dallas, where an unusually severe ice storm had driven the mercury below zero and prompted utility companies to orchestrate rolling blackouts across the city, with the exception of Cowboys Stadium.
“It won’t be anywhere near as cold Sunday in Dallas as it is today down there,” said Bruce Sullivan, a National Weather Service meteorologist.
In New York City, the locals called it the “Groundhog Day Storm” as they gingerly negotiated icy sidewalks, and Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg had an uplifting encounter with the city’s most famous groundhog, Staten Island Chuck, who, however improbably, predicted an early spring. (And you don’t mess with Chuck: In 2009 he bit the mayor’s hand, prompting Bloomberg to wear gloves for their next encounters.)
In Kansas City, Mo., Danny Rotert, an aide to Rep. Emanuel Cleaver II (D-Mo.), was hunkered down in his home, responding to questions via e-mail.
“The city is shut down and has declared an emergency,” he wrote. “… Even if I could shovel the driveway to get out, my street would be impassable.”
Some motorists were stuck for hours in their vehicles on snow-clogged highways.
On Chicago’s Lake Shore Drive, nearly 1,000 cars were stranded overnight. Just before dawn Wednesday, firefighters walked down the line of snow-caked cars, shining flashlights inside to check on motorists.
Joanna Moore, 24, and her boyfriend were returning home from the Downstream Casino Resort in Quapaw, Okla., when they got caught in whiteout on the Will Rogers Turnpike. They had two cups of hot chocolate and two muffins to tide them over between 9 a.m. and 8 p.m., when the National Guard rescued them.
They were among 16 people waiting out the storm at a Red Cross shelter set up in a local church. It was unclear when the couple would be able to retrieve their car and get home. Moore said she was crossing her fingers that they would be there in time for her 3-year-old daughter’s birthday Friday.
Meanwhile, officials began to prepare for an onslaught of insurance claims resulting from damaged properties like the Hard Rock Hotel & Casino near Tulsa, where part of the roof caved in.
Wet snow and heavy ice caused roofs to cave in and buildings to collapse in several states. A gas station canopy plummeted in Long Island, an airplane hanger in Boston and an entire brick building in northwest Connecticut.
Even sunny Arizona didn’t escape freezing temperatures, prompting a warning from the National Weather Service for Phoenix residents to keep their plants and pets warm.
In Milan, N.H., Brad Ray, 72, who used to rescue people from avalanches on Mt. Washington, wondered what all the fuss was about.
Yes, the snow was coming down, he said, and they had already had 12 inches.
No, he wasn’t rushing to plow his 1,325-foot driveway. “My plow truck is a pretty good size,” he said. “I have a lot of weight and chains on it. I don’t worry about pushing the snow.”
But even with all his equipment and know-how, he advised: “Listen to the professionals and don’t go out unless you really have to.”
By Richard Simon, Geraldine Baum and Abby Sewell, Los Angeles Times
February 3, 2011
Source: The Los Angeles Times
– Winter Storm Leaves Midwest, East Paralyzed (NPR):
Blizzard conditions stretching from Texas to Maine have paralyzed travel in major cities across the nation’s midsection, closing airports and schools and leaving downtowns looking like snow-covered deserts.
The storm — billed as the worst in decades — unleashed much of its fury on the heartland, bringing Chicago and the rest of the Midwest to a standstill. As it churned into New England, a number of roofs collapsed as a foot or more of snow piled atop the remains of last month’s blizzards.
Travelers at Boston’s Logan Airport, which was closed temporarily Wednesday for the first time this season because of ice, continued to face cancellations and delays. The storm tested even the hardiest New Englanders, including snowplow driver Dave Mastrioni, who was clearing snow for everyone from churches to private businesses and the city of Newton, Mass.
“It’s been about a hundred hours of plowing — that’s about two years’ worth,” he said.
– Powerful storm brings record snowfall across the country (CNN):
(CNN) — A massive winter storm bringing blizzard conditions and record snowfall to the nation’s heartland has affected one in three Americans, emergency officials said Wednesday.
A mix of snow, sleet and freezing rain blanketed 30 states and is now sweeping up into the U.S. Northeast.
The brutal weather made for treacherous traveling on snow-choked roadways and runways, forcing airlines to cancel thousands of flights again Wednesday.
The huge demand for information caused sporadic outages for the National Weather Service’s web servers, which struggled to handle a deluge of 10 million to 20 million hits per hour, officials said. The site normally experiences an average of 70 million hits per day.
Chicago’s O’Hare International Airport received a record-breaking 19 1/2 inches of snow, according to the service.
– Winter storm snowballs airlines (CNN)
Freezing: Only Florida, in the extreme southeast, has so far escaped snow fall as two storms cover virtually the whole of the U.S.
The U.S. is shivering in the grips of a freezing winter with 49 of its 50 states now having snow on the ground.
Two winter storms have dumped several inches of snow in some states and left flights grounded from Texas to the Carolinas.
Britain in Winter 2010 (copyright: Dr David Viner/Mark Lynas – Nostradamus Inc)
Until this week, the most-read story in the online edition of the Independent was Snowfalls are now just a thing of the past, the one from March 2000 in which top expert Dr David Viner of the top-rated Climatic Research Unit at the famed University of East Anglia used his superbly honed predictive powers to make this now legendary warning:
“Children just aren’t going to know what snow is.”
But it would be a shame if Dr David Viner were to take all the credit for the unutterable stupidity and wrongness of warmists everywhere. Here, for example, is a quote from a book published as recently as 2004: (H/T Ishmael2009)
On sale next to the desk were several Christmas cards, each showing children making a snowman under a heavy winter sky, the pretty white flakes swirling around them as they gathered up the snow in their duffle coats and woolly mittens. It was the traditional British winter, everyone’s dream of a white Christmas. And what no one knows – or likes to admit – is that it’s probably gone for good.
I haven’t seen snow like this for over seven years in Oxford, which isn’t too far from where I grew up. Back in 1996 there were a few days of snow (no big deal, less than ten centimetres deep. I remember it principally because I fell off my bicycle on the ice) but since then nothing. In fact snow has become so rare that when it does fall – often just for a few hours – everything grinds to a halt. In early 2003 a ‘mighty’ five-centimetre snowfall in southeast England caused such severe traffic jams that many motorists had to stay in their cars overnight. Today’s kids are missing out: I haven’t seen a snowball fight in years, and I can’t even remember the last time I saw a snowman.
Like the Christmas snow, the holly and the ivy may soon be distant memories.
Snow plows attempt to clear runways at Philadelphia International Airport as thousands of flights were cancelled across the East Coast
The white Christmas in the South was one for the record books. Columbia, South Carolina, had its first significant Christmas snow since weather records were first kept in 1887.
Atlanta had just over an inch of snow – the first measurable accumulation on Christmas Day since the 1880s.
Last updated at 8:29 PM on 27th December 2010
Full article here: Daily Mail
More:
In the UK:
– Travel comes to a standstill as blizzards batter US east coast (Guardian):
More than 3,000 flights cancelled, mostly from New York’s three main airports, stranding tens of thousands trying to return home after Christmas holiday.
– Snow cancels 4,000 flights, shuts NYC airports (USA Today):
A strong Christmas-weekend blizzard paralyzed travel along much of the East Coast on Monday, halting flights at the three New York City airports for much of the day.
For those stranded, airport and airline officials warned it could take “days” before they could be accommodated on future flights
A bicycle is buried in snow in the early morning hours in Manhattan’s East Village. Photographer: Mario Tama/Getty Images
Dec. 27 (Bloomberg) — New York City’s major airports remained closed after the heaviest December snowfall in six decades left travelers in the Northeast struggling amid waist- high drifts and blinding winds.
Central Park had 20 inches (51 centimeters) of snow by 8 a.m., the most for the month since 1948, the National Weather Service said. Skies cleared by daybreak while the agency issued blizzard warnings for Boston and into Maine.
The storm forced airlines to cancel more than 6,000 flights since yesterday. John F. Kennedy International and New Jersey’s Newark Liberty will reopen at 6 p.m., and LaGuardia Airport’s resumption time is undetermined, according to the Federal Aviation Administration’s website.
“It is horrendous in the New York City area,” Tom Kines, a meteorologist at State College, Pennsylvania-based AccuWeather Inc., said by telephone. “This is about as bad as it gets. There may have been storms that equaled this, but it doesn’t get much worse than this. To get this much snow with the amount of wind that is accompanying it, that is devastating.”
And everybody seems to find snow in midsummer wonderful???
Snow and ice covering building at Mount Hotham as snow fell in Australia Photo: AFP/GETTY
Freezing winds from Antarctica, blown up to Australia by a low-pressure system in the Southern Ocean, gave the country a taste of the conditions that are causing havoc across Europe.
Some 11 inches of snow fell at the ski fields in New South Wales, raising the prospect that parts of the country could experience a white Christmas.
“It’s white, everything is white,” Michelle Lovius, the general manager of the Kosciuszko Chalet Hotel at Charlotte Pass, said.
“First thing this morning everything was just very still, very peaceful and every single thing was just blanketed in a thick cover of white.”
At the ski fields, children in Father Christmas hats, who would usually be sunning themselves on the grassy slopes, made snowballs and rode on sleds.
Miss Lovius said such a large amount of snow was unusual for early December, normally the peak of the wild flower season in the mountainous region.
“We’re hoping that it (the cold) stays in for five days and we get a white Christmas,” she said.
In one part of the state temperatures dropped as low 39.2F (4C), the coldest December morning in 54 years, according to the Weather Channel.
Further south in the state of Victoria, Mt Hotham had four inches of snow and Mt Buller up to two inches.
“It is a blanket of white, which is beautiful at this time of year.
Read moreWintry Weather Brings Snow to Australia in MIDSUMMER
Summer in Australia!
Hikers at Charlotte Pass lookout in the NSW Snowy Mountains were greeted with 10cm of fresh snow as a cold snap hits the eastern coast of Australia. Picture: Steve Cuff
THONGS and board shorts gave way to beanies and scarves yesterday as summer gave way to a wintry blast of snow and icy temperatures in the country’s southeast.
While the bitter freeze in Europe continues, Victoria and NSW have had a cold snap of their own, with off-season ski slopes transformed into winter wonderlands.
About 30cm of snow fell at Perisher in NSW yesterday, while Victoria’s Mount Hotham received a 10cm dusting on Sunday.
Charlotte’s Pass in the NSW Snowy Mountains also received a 10cm sprinkling of snow, prompting would-be bushwalkers to don clothing more suitable for skiing.
It was surprising to see the Kosciuszko Chalet Hotel blanketed with snow at this time of year, resort manager Michelle Lovius told The Australian yesterday.
“I’m sitting inside in my scarf and beanie,” she said.
“When you walk in it, it’s up past your ankles and it’s just started snowing heavily again. ”
In Sydney yesterday, there were blustery winds and unseasonably low temperatures of just 13C. The western suburb of Horsley Park recorded 9.8C and the Blue Mountains dropped to -2C.
Read moreAustralia: Bitter Summer Freeze Bites Eastern States As Summer Gives Way To Snow And Cold
Related articles:
No traffic on the M61 in Lancashire as heavy snow shuts part of the motorway
Millions of Britons faced travel misery today with planes grounded, rail services cancelled and roads rendered impassable on what is traditionally the busiest weekend before Christmas.
Plunging temperatures and heavy snow saw large swathes of the country grind to a standstill, as London’s Gatwick Airport closed its runway and British Airways cancelled flights at Heathrow.
Overnight blizzards and plummeting temperatures buckled a huge chunk of the nation’s road and rail networks, as the latest blast of wintery weather showed little sign of easing.
This weekend is expected to be the busiest for retailers and commuters in the run-up to December 25 but many are expected to face chaos as the transport network bears the brunt of the big freeze.
Air passengers have already faced disruption at Exeter, London City, Aberdeen and Cardiff airports, while Belfast City was closed last night, with flights expected to resume at 11am.
Southampton Airport was closed until 12pm and flights to certain destinations from Birmingham were also grounded.
Delays and cancellations were expected at Belfast International while a spokesman for Heathrow said the airport was open but would be “challenged” today.
“Heathrow is fully operational but we are expecting more snow and planning for the worst,” he said.
Added: 15. Dezember 2010
Snow storm in Sarnia Ontario, Canada on the 402, video taken from inside/outside of a car, worst storm in the past 25 years.
* Storm that paralysed Midwest moves north into Canada
* Eight people killed in traffic accidents as bone-chilling temperatures grip much of America
* Five men lose their lives shovelling snow as 2 feet falls in just 24 hours
* But southern California bathes in balmy temperatures
‘Despair’: A truck is stranded on the Highway 402 near Sarnia, Ontario today. Up to 360 vehicles were trapped at one point
The Canadian military is racing to rescue more than 300 motorists who are trapped on a highway in the worst storm to hit Ontario in 25 years.
Some people were trapped for nearly 24 hours with snow piled up so high they could not open the doors of their cars on Highway 402 outside the town of Sarnia.
The military has mobilised a CC-130 Hercules airplane, two Griffons helicopters and an array of snowmobiles and four-wheel drive SUVs for the rescue effort.
They have reached some motorists just in the nick of time.
‘You really felt almost despair,’ Brandon Junkin, who had run out of gas and was trapped in his truck for nearly 24 hours with just a blanket to ward off the sub-zero temperatures, told CNN.
He was rescued when he heard a military helicopter hovering over him.
Read moreWorst Snow Storm In 25 Years Traps 300 Motorists in Ontario
* Temperatures could break record low of -23C
* Hard frost between snowfalls means dangerous weekend conditions
Record: A walker trudges through deep snow during the first round off the Big Freeze in Braemar, Scotland, which could see record low temperatures this winter
Britain is bracing itself for fresh snowfalls tonight as a second bout of the Big Freeze is predicted to stretch its icy grip across the country.
Forecasters are predicting temperatures could fall below the current record low of minus 23C and that the bitter cold will extend into mid-February.
The dramatic change in weather conditions is due to arrive tonight with up to eight inches of snow drifting in on savage Arctic winds.
With severe weather warnings in place for ten regions, the cold is expected to first blow in through the east of Scotland and then push into Northern England overnight, creating icy conditions by rush hour tomorrow morning.
That will be followed by heavy snowfall throughout Thursday morning which will get steadily worse until the weekend.
‘Because we have already had a cold start in December and the first bout of snow, I wouldn’t be surprised if a record is broken this winter,’ said Mr Powell.
‘The lowest temperatures we are predicting at the moment will be -11c in Braemar, near Fort William in Scotland, but with a wind chill of -17, which is how it will actually feel to people there.
‘The record for Scotland is -23 at Braemar in 1919, and I wouldn’t be surprised if that goes this winter.
Read moreForecasters Predict UK Big Freeze Could Last Until Mid-February
No way through: Huge snowfall obscures the view of the Brandenburg Gate in Berlin
Not a single train ran without delays in the whole of the country.
In the state of North Rhine-Westphalia in the west there were some 700 accidents on the autobahns during 12 hours of snowfall. And even international airports like Dusseldorf had to shut down on Monday night as the snow blew in.
Jack-knifed trucks littered the motorway network across the country.
Many fellow truckers trying to pull lorries free of snowdrifts found themselves suddenly trapped.
Rising temperatures at the weekend following by a plunging thermometer on Monday created black ice across the country. The S-Bahn network in Berlin that carries most commuters to work was severely delayed due to frozen points.
Hamburg saw 400 road accidents within 12 hours and in the former British army garrison town of Osnabrueck all public transport was suspended because of the state of the roads.
“It is absolute chaos here,“ an Osnabrueck police spokesman said.
On the A9 autobahn leading into Munich the traffic jam into the city reached 18 miles long. In Nuremberg a sports hall and stadium were closed due to the build up of ice and snow on the roof.
Read moreGermany Brought To Near Standstill By 12 Hours of Solid Snowfall