To think there is a complete over reaction to a bit of snow?

[MycatsaPirate]

Firstly I'm on the south coast of England but I lived in Scotland for 23 years where they get proper snow. It wasn't unusual to have months of icy pavements and roads and it was regularly below zero.

The amount of snow that has fallen in England (particularly the south) is pitiful and the BBC have devoted their entire morning to it. Reporting live from Canterbury is some poor reporter who has to pan the camera round to the grass where it looks like they may have had a heavy frost.

I have already seen two threads about ice and snow and how they can't possibly leave the house today.

Every single time there is snow in England, the whole place seems to grind to a halt. It's actually embarrassing.

1cm of snow is not dramatic, nor will it stop you going about your daily life. Just wrap up warm and leave earlier than usual.

Scotland, I apologise for the BBC this morning. You must all have been cringing into your cornflakes.

[Buggeritimgettingup]

It's worse though as it's now it that there London town....... it may be a national crisis

[AllTheBabies]

I think it's hilarious! I grew up in Highlands and to have prolonged periods of heavy snow was just normal. It happened every year with minimal fuss. We lived on a farm and just had to get on with it.

I still live in Scotland but lower down and I miss the proper snow.

[SundialShadow]

Stop piddling over our survival accomplishments. We made it people and lived to tell the tale on the interwebs!

[DustyMaiden]

I agree. DD is driving from Cornwall to Essex today trying to find out if it will be ok. None of the forecasts predict the chaos the headlines suggest.

[SugarMiceInTheRain]

I think it's hilarious, but yes also embarrassing, how the country grinds to a halt and deems it newsworthy. It happens ever year, it's called weather. People from countries where they get real snow must be

[Yankeedoodledickhead]

Ordinarily I'd agree with you. A fart-ful and we're in disaster.

However, I'd decided by 6am this morning that I wasn't taking the kids to school and they're having a snow day because I'm 33 weeks with a high risk pregnancy and am too afraid to walk up the hill to school in case I fall over

[ChardonnayKnickertonSmythe]

If the heavy rain we had yesterday had turned to snow it would I'd have been warranted, but it's only a bit chilly as it is.

The news people always overreact when there's some snow forecast.

[LittleLionMansMummy]

Yanbu. We don't have any where I am, but I always think the same. We visited sil and bil near Glasgow a few years ago. That was proper, dig your car out of the driveway, all the way up your wellies snow.

[MaidOfStars]

He he, I'm in the Peaks and we woke up to a good few inches of snow. When this happens, I sometimes can't (easily) get to work in Manchester (and therefore might not leave the house). This is because: 1. I can't get the car out of our steep cul-de-sac, although more of an issue when the few inches turns to ice. 2. The infrequent trains are usually cancelled because staff experience problems getting to work. 3. I'm not walking/cycling 15 miles. 4. I'm not walking down to the main road for a booked taxi at a cost of £40 (although would do this if I had anything critically important to go in for).

So a 90 min bus/10 min walk to tram/20 min tram/20 min walk to work would be my only option. I'm so glad my time at work is my own.

[KinkyAfro]

Yesterday before it had 3ven started the guys at work were worrying about getting to work today. There's absolutely nothing here apart from rain, out of a team of 12, 2 of us have arrived

[MycatsaPirate]

They BBC have just (barely) mentioned that Scotland had huge amounts of snow last night and 10 schools are closed. From my experience there needs to be a LOT of snow to close the schools in Scotland.

Then they have gone back to Canterbury and studio man says 'oh that's a lot of snow' YOU CAN SEE THE BLOODY GRASS THROUGH THE SNOW!!

I bet they wished they had sent reporter man somewhere else :o

[MycatsaPirate]

Peaks, Yorkshire, North of England all have weather on a par with Scotland so you are excused.

I am talking about the South of England where it looks like someone has sprinkled a tiny bit of icing sugar about.

One airport even cancelled a load of flights yesterday lunchtime before it had even started snowing. Baffling.

[MiddlingMum]

Years ago, my DCs school was shut because we'd had about 2 cm of snow. I was in town with them and we bumped into a Swiss woman I knew. She asked if we were having a day off school and almost choked with laughter when I told her the reason.

[MaidOfStars]

BTW, the trains are steill running so no snow day for me.

I always think the problem is more one of having the infrastructure and coping mechanisms for snow/ice. We'll have gritter vans out tonight but until then, my market town will be impossible to navigate if you're in any way unsteady on your feet or particularly vulnerable in the case of a fall. Yet all the weather forecasts said we'd have snow last night - why weren't we gritted last might then?

[badfurday]

Its pathetic. I live in Surrey and we got maybe an inch? Yes the side roads are a touch icy, but very passable.
I was the first one into work this morning and I live the furthest away.
As other staff filter in I am hearing tales of woe, apparently it was really really bad where they were, like there house/area has its own crazy weather as its on "high ground" Really? Come on ffs, its Surrey!

[QueenLaBeefah]

I grew up in the highlands and just watched the Canterbury snow crisis. Utterly hilarious.

[ChuckSnowballs]

I am from Canada and ordinarily I would agree with you.

However. None of the Uk is geared up for snow, even if it is the depth of a midge's bollock deeper than a frost.

I've got to work using the motorway network many times, living 50-100 ish miles away, when locals never managed to make it in. I've also been caught in total chaos on the way home, once spending 4 hours [4 hours] to go round a particularly grim town centre as it was complete gridlock, and then having another 4 hours to actually get home once I had extricated myself from the nightmare - and another time having to abandon the car on the way home and walk several miles home - when the snow started falling as I was reaching the north of the town i lived in the south of.

It isn't the snow, it is the complete reaction to it, the panic, the lack of driving skills, the lack of gritters and clearing machines.

I now work mainly from home so today it is heating on, lashings of black coffee and crack on with work. And hoping my OH doesn't get caught in a travel nightmare this afternoon as he works about 80 miles from home.

[OhYouBadBadKitten]

people are out of practise! and it was quite a tricky combination of heavy rain , snow then freezing. Much easier when its just snow. Its been several years since there has been a reasonable snowfall and some areas did get some disruption. However, if the bbc havent been focusing on the evacuation of thousands from the east coast then they do have their priorities wrong

[LunaLoveg00d]

YANBU. We are just outside Glasgow and we had a wee bit of snow yesterday but nothing to write home about. We just get on with it - check road cameras and websites before travelling, keep up to date with the forecast. Wouldn't be planning a sightseeing trip up the A9 to Inverness today, for example.

Snow south of the Watford Gap or - horror of horrors - in Kent or Surrey is headline news. Even though it's what we'd call a wee skiff.

[Thegirlinthefireplace]

"The south" covers more than just Canterbury that you saw on the news. Levels of snow, road type and conditions, extent of gritting etc varies tremendously across the region.

Of course no where in the SE will have as much snow as the highlands, they will also fewer resources to deal with it as it is less frequent

[OhYouBadBadKitten]

Maid, gritting was tricky. Too early and it would have been washed away by the rain, too late and you end up with snarling up of traffic and gritters cant get through.

[badfurday]

Agreed Ohyou, the evacuation of the East coast should be top of the news, that is a potentially very bad situation.

[badfurday]

Just had my first patient call to cancel his appointment today as he is "knee deep" in snow

[LadyTrevelyan]

Xh informed me last night that he would not be seeing the DC this weekend due to "the adverse weather conditions would cause problems driving".

London to near Brighton . What a Sally

[LadyTrevelyan]

What a wally!