It's snowing!

[mattc]

All wet and melting here. Really rather slippy and unpleasant.

Still sub-zero in the shade here, but the sun has melted some bits. Only main roads are properly clear in the middle

So we've got the worst of all worlds - slippery as heck nearly everywhere.

[Wowbagger]

We took the dog out for a couple of miles across the tundra of central Essex - and it really was tundra! The soil has become so frozen that the last lot of snow had partially melted and, being unable to drain away because of the depthy of the frozen soil beneath, refrozen, leaving pools of sheet ice which are most treacherous to walk on. Normally, an Essex cold snap gives a thin crust of frozen stuff and it doesn't take a lot to go through it to the soft mud beneath, but not this time.

Very slippery and crunchy.

[gordon taylor]

It's amazing here in the lowland bit of Staffordshire. Snow that fell a week ago is still  deep on the ground, and the big fall from Wednesday is still stuck to the tree branches. It is minus twelve again this morning.

We usually have snow lying overnight only, then it goes. I've never seen anything like this.

[robgul]

It's amazing here in the lowland bit of Staffordshire. Snow that fell a week ago is still  deep on the ground, and the big fall from Wednesday is still stuck to the tree branches. It is minus twelve again this morning.

We usually have snow lying overnight only, then it goes. I've never seen anything like this.

Were you not around in 1963? -  snowed on Boxing Day (everywhere IIRC, I lived in NE London*), still on the ground in parts of the UK at Easter (I recollect that high up above Buttermere on Good Friday the snow was thigh-deep)

I had cause to go to an office in one of the courtyard places off Fleet St, I think, 2 days after Christmas and the snow had blown/drifted higher than the top of the front doors!!

Rob

Edit : In case a pedant comes along ... the Boxing Day was 1962's.  

AND amazingly, we didn't lose any days of school (it was my last year) right through the severe weather - none of this mamby-pamby H&S stuff and not being safe for the teachers.  Teachers were MEN in those days (in fact at my school they all were male save for one Maths teacher who it transpired many years later when times became more liberated came out of the proverbial closet)

[hellymedic]

I think Gordy, like me, was only a Small Child in 1963.
I remember little of that winter but know we were moving house in Harlot (from Little Brays to Finchmoor for those wot kno). Dad always regales us with tales of how the diesel in the removal van froze (or at least gelled) and of how pipes burst, causing water to come through the ceiling roses on his first night in the new place. He'd moved in ahead of wife + 3 smalls.

Here in Londonton, last week's snow still lies in the garden and Northolt was -9°C at 8am today.

[Wowbagger]

I am seeing mixed forecasts at the moment. Freezing weather set to return across the country | UK news | The Guardian talks about yesterday's "double-digit temperatures" but I suspect that the poor reporter has got his brain in a twist. So far as I can tell, the warmest place yesterday was the Scilly Isles at 6.1°C. There were plenty of places with double-digit temperatures all right - but they were negative numbers! My brother, 6 miles S of Shrewsbury, reckoned it was the coldest Christmas day he can remember (he was born in 1945). He was's sure what his minimum temperature was on Christmas day: one thermometer recorded -10, the other -13.

I remember quite a lot about the 1962-63 winter, the most frustrating part of which was that we took my brother's old camera out with us but none of them came out. We discovered later that the lens was no longer in the camera and I suspect it had simply contracted in the bitter cold and fallen out.

But weren't you in Staffs in 1982, Gordy? England's lowest ever temperature was recorded in Shropshire on 10th Jan. We had a bloody cold December that year, with snow failing (IIRC) on 8th and lying around until the new year.

[border-rider]

-13.8 here at 7:30  this morning - or at least at The Hendre, which is down in the Trothy Valley.  Likely much colder here.

Warmer now though, but still below freezing.

[Chris S]

Looks like we are in for a couple of days of messy transition from Arctic to Atlantic airmass. Expect snow, sleet, cold rain and mist; and a raw southerly wind.

By Wednesday, it should be lovely and mild. Looking forward to getting out on the bike perhaps, without fearing the ice demon.

It's going to take ages for the ground to thaw out properly though. The freezing depth is well over 30cm now. If it rains heavily, the water will have nowhere to go. Expect floods.

[Wowbagger]

3 deg, cloudy and a southerly wind here.

[SandyV]

I've just seen the weather forecast for New Year's Day - they say it will be 38 degrees here   

Hope not!

[mondobongo]

We've had another smattering overnight, just enough to knacker the Club run this morning.

[bobb]

I've just seen the weather forecast for New Year's Day - they say it will be 38 degrees here   

Hope not!

Poor you!! 

It's funny thinking about it, both the hottest and coldest I've ever been were both in Australia.

The hottest was playing in a golf competition at some course maybe 50 miles or so inland of Sydney. My car had decided it was time for the air conditioning pump to die. So I was roasting even before I got there. There was a thermometer outside the club house and it was a full 45 degrees in the shade !! I don't think I have ever sweated so much! I also must have smashed down at least 2 gallons of water on my way round. I did win though 

The coldest would be being stuck on a knackered chair lift at Thredbo. The weather was terrible and they only opened the lifts so they could flog passes. About halfway up the mountain it stopped. I just thought some twat has just had a "Incapable of getting off the lift" moment and it would start up again soon enough. Three hours later I was eventually winched off. I was frozen. My knees didn't work any more but the only way was down, so off I went. I reckon it took a full 24 hours in front of the fire to get my core temperature back up to normal! Happy days....

[Cudzoziemiec]

Ice and wind.

[woollypigs]

Not sure if it is raining or snowing here, BB8.

[toekneep]

Wet snow on and off here but it is finally thawing. Drip, drip, drip.

[Wowbagger]

3°C, S, ave 5kph, 1018.1 mb, 83% humidity. 

[SandyV]

3°C, S, ave 5kph, 1018.1 mb, 83% humidity. 

so the new technology is a success?

[Mrs Pingu]

It's melting! Yeeeha!
There appears to be a small stream running down the path at the side of the building.

[Wowbagger]

3°C, S, ave 5kph, 1018.1 mb, 83% humidity. 

so the new technology is a success?

A limited one. The limitations are the small size of our garden and the proximity to trees. unless you've got a lot of land, I think any weather station will be a compromise. Where ours is, I think our wind readings will be inaccurate. The rest should be OK.

[Mrs Pingu]

There appears to be a small stream running down the path at the side of the building.

Oh bollocks. That'll be because my downstairs neighbour's utility room in the outside washhouse appears to have a burst pipe. Well that's what it sounds like. It's locked. I hope this is because he knows about it already and has gone to get supplies to do something about it, and hasn't instead disappeared off somewhere til after the new year.

[Wowbagger]

3°C, S, ave 5kph, 1018.1 mb, 83% humidity. 

so the new technology is a success?

A limited one. The limitations are the small size of our garden and the proximity to trees. unless you've got a lot of land, I think any weather station will be a compromise. Where ours is, I think our wind readings will be inaccurate. The rest should be OK.

Oh, and when Dez has done his stuff there will be a web page showing all the readings. He would have already done this except the 8Gb SD card that was sent with the Sheeva plug was faulty. He's hoping to set up an old laptop today to do the job until the replacement card is sent.

[jogler]

It certainly is.Flakes like dinner plates,& it's sticking

[andrewc]

It's warming up in Liverpool, a whole 2C, I've got running water for the first time in a week     Now to catch up with the backlog of washing 

[Quint]

+ 3c here, positively tropical, with any luck I shall be able to do my New Years day pub crawl fitness ride

[mondobongo]

Its on the thaw fast here, looks like being a mild night which should bode well for getting shut completely.