On Tuesday 5th January this week, the Skegness Standard, one of our local newspapers, carried the headline "Heavy Snow Hits Skegness" which was a grossly exaggerated statement considering the amount of snow which actually fell. Reading beyond the attention-grabbing headline I read that only "one and a half inches of snow" had actually fallen! "Oh no", I thought, "panic hits the streets! What are we going to do?".
BBC Five Live gave an equally ludicrous account of the recent snowfall too, stating that as much as two inches had fallen in places with temperatures "plummeting to freezing point".
Obviously there are people who are vulnerable to such temperatures. It's a pity that our greedy energy suppliers charge extortionate amounts for their services that people die because they feel they cannot afford to turn up the heating.
Only a few days ago I was listening to a weather forecast on a radio station in the Canadian Prairies which casually forecast temperatures were going to fall to -40 degrees C overnight. Maybe it's an unfair comparison but THAT is SEVERE weather. Doesn't it put everything into perspective though?
Only a few days ago I was listening to a weather forecast on a radio station in the Canadian Prairies which casually forecast temperatures were going to fall to -40 degrees C overnight. Maybe it's an unfair comparison but THAT is SEVERE weather. Doesn't it put everything into perspective though?
Sadly, it won't stop our newspapers and broadcasters attempting to scare the nation with pathetic headlines such as "Britain In Grip Of Sub Arctic Temperatures" (Really?) and "Government Declares State Of Emergency As Two Snowflakes Were Spotted". OK, I made up the last headline but, amazingly, not the first!
By the way, where is this country "Britain" anyway? I live in England.
Ha ha ha that last "headline" made me laugh John!
ReplyDeleteWe now have just over 3 inches of level snow here after several hours of snowfall, the deepest I've seen for a couple of years. As a result of the snow we were sent home from work a little after 9 this morning.
This is no worse than the wintry spells that used to occur fairly regularly in the 80s.
Hi Nick. Being almost prehistoric, I go back to a time when snowfall was typically one to two metres deep in winter. During my final school years in the early 70s, I used to walk there and back, home for dinner, every day for five years. No bus route. No transport. It was a kilometre each way, so that's four kilometres per day, come sun, rain, snow, fog, etc. "Thee dunt know thee's born today lad", as somebody once said. Eeeee, them were t'days!
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