No statistical evidence here but I think I can vouch for cold and snow for winter 1985/86 in rural Leicester. CH boiler packed up and I was also infilling the base of a 50 x 20 ft GH with breezeblocks - I was freezing both indoors and out !962/63 was snowy and cold in Cheshire but a hot summer there in 1976. Severe floods in Somerset in 2013 and only one noticeable ( ie lasted on the ground for 3 or 4 days ! ) snowfall in coastal Somerset in 2014/15. A few miles further inland - a different matter. Snow at Easter in SW France in 1992 - bit of a shock. I used to record the weather on a daily basis but no longer bother so now it is only the exceptional cold/hot years which stand out in my mind. Always interesting to hear what is happening in various locales tho
Being back from Germany on Wednesday and having plenty of work on Thursday and yesterday, it's weekend and I have time to relax. I had a look into my blog when exactly was the time we had snow in 2017 and it was the 10th of December (I remembered wrong with the 4th as I had stated originally). That snow didn't last long, just for 2 days, because I visited Avebury on the 12th and there is no snow on the pictures, but it was a cold wind.
Our part is expecting snow in the next days, and because it stays cold, the snow could stay until the 19th, so windy.com. The BBC is more optimistic and raises the temperature by 3 degrees to 7C over the day and 3C over night. In 2009, we got the freezing temperatures around the 18th of December and that cold stayed until mid January 2010.
So far, we have a nice winter with a dry cold and no wind. Even Europe mainland gets its cold and snow. In my Berkshire/Wiltshire experience, a cold front ends usually after 2 weeks with the exception of 2009/2010 when it lasted for 3 weeks. If that applies for this winter, then I would be happy.
Speaking for myself, I definitely can't wait for February, when I will start to take out the seeds
We're not that far from you @Simone_in_Wiltshire, and yes we also had a heavy snowstorm on the 10th December 2017. We watched people sledging down the hills opposite. It thawed the very next day though. My records don't go back to 2009 so can't remember what the weather was like then.
I definitely like the sound of a 2 week winter! Roll on February as you say.
We are overdue for a big freeze. I read today that the Northpole is currently under a kind of bubble which keeps the both directions of the polar vortex over Canada and Russia for longer than thought in November. That normally means a cold winter in Europe mainland in January and February when the east wind starts in particular in February. That’s why we have had often snow on the 2 February. I remember the frosty 2 weeks in the first half of February with an average of minus 12 C 20 years ago. I found it much of a relief that the South of England was warm compared to Eastern Germany.
Just looked back at my records since 2010. We don't appear to have had lots of snow for long here in Dec, Jan & Feb. Most thaws out in a couple of days fortunately.
Hope you wrong about the big freeze, I hate cold weather.
Me too @Lizzie27. In fact experiencing 14C on 2 March 2003 in Broadway coming from -5C in Berlin let me say after my first stay here, “I have to move to England” 😀 I do hope that we in the NE of Wiltshire are not affected by the snow in the next days, but we will get snowflakes at least.
It's obviously heading east We had a little more last night, yesterday's is still lying - it's the dry powdery stuff that squeaks when you walk on it. I guess we've had half an inch of it - not very much. We've lived in this place for a little less than 14 years now. I think we've had some snowfall every year we've been here, but only a handful of times it's lasted more than an afternoon. We moved in on the last day in February in 2009. In the 5 years before we came here, we were living in Bristol. To the best of my recollection, we had no snow, or even hard frost, in those years until the February of 2009 when we had about a week of deep snow. I remember it because OH was trying to get this place ready for us to move in and he couldn't drive down. In the March of that year, when we'd just got here, we had a few days when snow fell but it didn't last long. That has been a regular pattern here - snow fall in March or April that lasts just a few hours. 2010 we had deep snow - a couple of feet - in the first week in January and again in mid December at the end of that year. If we get more than a couple of inches of it, we'll be effectively snowed in, so it sticks in the memory. The only other time I remember was 2018' Beast - that was March, wasn't it? My birthday is at the end of January. It snowed on my 18th (very unusual in Cornwall) and then one year since we've been here. Normally the snow comes later, in February or early March. It snowed twice on other occasions in the 18 years I lived in Cornwall - enough to make a snowman. One time was New Year in the late 70s, and one in the early 80s. January 1987 we had a really cold week - I was living in Plymouth and remember going to a building with water problems. The tank in the roof space had frozen.
I am a weather nerd too, but I don't keep my own records. I do regularly visit the Met Office records sites. I'm more interested in temperature than snowfall. The systems I design have a 'design temperature' - minimum for heating, maximum for cooling, so I tend to focus on when the temperature exceeds those limits - below minus 4 or above 32. It happens most years, but the latter far more often than the former.
Gardening on the edge of Exmoor, in Devon
“It's still magic even if you know how it's done.”
I can't find records for my town, but the most snow I've ever seen in one storm was just over 30 inches (70+ cm). In December 2020, while my house was being built, we had a storm that dropped 28 inches of snow. A "normal" storm will see snowfall accumulate between 3-6 inches.
As for cold, the coldest stretch I've ever dealt with was eight days straight of below zero F, but with strong winds. Factoring in the wind chill it was between -15 to -22 F (about -30 C) during that time.
So far this winter we've only had one accumulating snow of 3 inches, followed by abnormally warm temperatures and rain.
New England, USA
Metacomet soil with hints of Woodbridge and Pillsbury
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!962/63 was snowy and cold in Cheshire but a hot summer there in 1976. Severe floods in Somerset in 2013 and only one noticeable ( ie lasted on the ground for 3 or 4 days ! ) snowfall in coastal Somerset in 2014/15. A few miles further inland - a different matter. Snow at Easter in SW France in 1992 - bit of a shock.
I used to record the weather on a daily basis but no longer bother so now it is only the exceptional cold/hot years which stand out in my mind.
Always interesting to hear what is happening in various locales tho
I had a look into my blog when exactly was the time we had snow in 2017 and it was the 10th of December (I remembered wrong with the 4th as I had stated originally). That snow didn't last long, just for 2 days, because I visited Avebury on the 12th and there is no snow on the pictures, but it was a cold wind.
Our part is expecting snow in the next days, and because it stays cold, the snow could stay until the 19th, so windy.com. The BBC is more optimistic and raises the temperature by 3 degrees to 7C over the day and 3C over night.
In 2009, we got the freezing temperatures around the 18th of December and that cold stayed until mid January 2010.
So far, we have a nice winter with a dry cold and no wind. Even Europe mainland gets its cold and snow.
In my Berkshire/Wiltshire experience, a cold front ends usually after 2 weeks with the exception of 2009/2010 when it lasted for 3 weeks.
If that applies for this winter, then I would be happy.
Speaking for myself, I definitely can't wait for February, when I will start to take out the seeds
I ♥ my garden.
My records don't go back to 2009 so can't remember what the weather was like then.
I definitely like the sound of a 2 week winter! Roll on February as you say.
“It's still magic even if you know how it's done.”
I ♥ my garden.
Hope you wrong about the big freeze, I hate cold weather.
I do hope that we in the NE of Wiltshire are not affected by the snow in the next days, but we will get snowflakes at least.
I ♥ my garden.
I ♥ my garden.
We had a little more last night, yesterday's is still lying - it's the dry powdery stuff that squeaks when you walk on it. I guess we've had half an inch of it - not very much.
We've lived in this place for a little less than 14 years now. I think we've had some snowfall every year we've been here, but only a handful of times it's lasted more than an afternoon. We moved in on the last day in February in 2009.
In the 5 years before we came here, we were living in Bristol. To the best of my recollection, we had no snow, or even hard frost, in those years until the February of 2009 when we had about a week of deep snow. I remember it because OH was trying to get this place ready for us to move in and he couldn't drive down.
In the March of that year, when we'd just got here, we had a few days when snow fell but it didn't last long. That has been a regular pattern here - snow fall in March or April that lasts just a few hours.
2010 we had deep snow - a couple of feet - in the first week in January and again in mid December at the end of that year. If we get more than a couple of inches of it, we'll be effectively snowed in, so it sticks in the memory. The only other time I remember was 2018' Beast - that was March, wasn't it?
My birthday is at the end of January. It snowed on my 18th (very unusual in Cornwall) and then one year since we've been here. Normally the snow comes later, in February or early March.
It snowed twice on other occasions in the 18 years I lived in Cornwall - enough to make a snowman. One time was New Year in the late 70s, and one in the early 80s. January 1987 we had a really cold week - I was living in Plymouth and remember going to a building with water problems. The tank in the roof space had frozen.
I am a weather nerd too, but I don't keep my own records. I do regularly visit the Met Office records sites. I'm more interested in temperature than snowfall. The systems I design have a 'design temperature' - minimum for heating, maximum for cooling, so I tend to focus on when the temperature exceeds those limits - below minus 4 or above 32. It happens most years, but the latter far more often than the former.
“It's still magic even if you know how it's done.”