"Gavin Staples" wrote in message
...

wrote in message
oups.com...
Yes. I was a Met Office observer at Cardiff Airport (Rhoose) in Jan 82
and the snow started just before the beginning of my night shift at
2100 on the Thursday and did not cease until mid-afternoon on the
Saturday, most of it moderate or heavy and with an easterly gale and a
temperature well below zero.
Cardiff was almost cut off, and in the SW Wales Valleys where
conditions were even worse, most home-owners were trapped in their
houses as the snow had drifted up to the bedroom windows.
My car was trapped at the airport for over a week as the snow was so
deep but fortunately walking to work was not too bad because I only
lived a mile away. The difficult thing was trying to avoid the deep
level snow which was waist high and difficult to get out of if you
stepped onto it by mistake.
The amazing thing was how close the warm air came to the South Wales
coast, as at one time we had minus 3C with a 30 knot northeasterly,
while Chivenor had a 20 knot southwesterly and a temperature of plus
6C. Talk about convergence....


This was a real classic one. I was living in the centre of Cambridge, low
lying we are here. We ended up with about 9 inches of level snow, no
drifting or any of that stuff. What we got was the most amazing frosts.
The
snow started with a temp of -2C and proceeded to FALL as the snow
progressed. I had not seen this before. By the time the snow ceased after
about 36 hours there was around 8 to 9 inches of powder snow and the
temperature had fallen to -7C. This to me was remarkable.
When the sky cleared over this powder snow, didn't it get cold. -10C
and
then -6C max the following day and then a freezing fog. Then that cleared
one evening and then, wump -17C, and for the next 4 days maximums at -5C
or
lower!! and a fabulous rime frost.
This had the mechanism to be an amazing winter so soon after December
1981 but the rest of the winter bored your socks off and it fell out of
any
chance of being severe despite these 2 wonderful cold spells.

Gavin.


I remember it well, living in Southampton at the time. Even on that part of
the South coast, the blizzard lasted from Thursday night (7th) to Saturday
afternoon (9th) without any surface appearence of warm air although a short
spell of freezing rain occurred Saturday morning before the snow came back.
This became one of the best snowfalls I have experienced, only a spell
living at 200m ASL near East Kilbride from 1990 to 1998 producing better!
IIRC, the Southampton Evening Echo referred to it as one of the heaviest
snowfalls of the 20th Century along that part of the South Coast. There had
been little snow of the 1981/82 spell previous to that event in Southampton,
although they shared in the very cold weather from early December. The 13th
December snowfall was very wet and did not last on the ground for more than
Sunday evening.

Following the blizzard, the snow lay without any thaw, even on the roads
(around Millbrook/Shirley) until Friday 15th when, initially a slow thaw
commenced, this accelerating over the weekend. The lowest night temperature
of this spell in the city was -11C on (IIRC) the 11th Jan.

I'm not sure how far North the blizzard extended but my parents in
Macclesfield got very little and a very clear evening/night on Saturday in
that part of the Country allowed an uninterrupted view of a Lunar eclipse on
Saturday evening. No chance of seeing that on the South Coast.

Once the snow went, that was the end of that winter and it was to become by
far the most eventful winter event of my 5 years from late 1979 to late 1984
in that area.

--
Pete

Please take my dog out twice to e-mail

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