Snow covers Britain with big freeze

snow in UK

Snow is expected to blanket the UK for the next week, with no end to the freezing conditions in sight.

The forecast of prolonged cold weather is likely to bring further delays and cancellations to travel plans after two days of snow disrupted airports and transport networks.

On Saturday, Heathrow invoked new weather planning operations for the first time and cancelled 20% of flights ahead of snowfall.

In 2010, heavy snow brought chaos to the UK's primary air hub but after a L36m investment in cold weather equipment the airport said it was coping with this week's wintry conditions. It pointed out that a reduction in its capacity was primarily due to low visibility rather than snow clogging up the runways.

Large parts of the UK will experience further snowfall on Sunday, with up to 4cm falling in the north and west, and 6cm in the east Midlands, East Anglia and the south-east, including London.

Up to 10cm could fall in local areas, and 15cm on higher ground, weather experts said.

The Met Office has issued yellow warnings for ice for much of the country and advised people to take extra care as snow turns to ice in the sub-zero conditions.

In the Scottish Highlands, four climbers were swept to their deaths in an avalanche, while in Humberside seven people were taken to hospital after a doubledecker bus collided with two cars and ploughed into a garden, fire and rescue services said.

Travellers at regional airports including Leeds Bradford, Humberside and Newcastle were also frustrated by delays and disruption caused by the wintry weather.

The road and rail networks were also braced for further bad weather. The M48 Severn Bridge was closed in both directions between junctions 1 and 2, and was not expected to reopen until midday on Sunday.

Among rail services, Eurostar warned that all trains will be delayed on Sunday, with a number of services to and from Paris and Brussels cancelled.

Thousands of passengers were stranded at Heathrow for a second day on Saturday after planes were grounded. British Airways cancelled at least 100 flights, leaving people stuck for hours on planes or stranded at the airport.

On Saturday, passengers branded BA's treatment of them as "appalling" and said staff were not keeping them informed as to what was happening. BA and the airport insisted they were doing everything they could in difficult circumstances.

A spokeswoman for Heathrow said that until Sunday airlines had been making their own decisions to cancel flights.

"A lot of what has been happening at Heathrow before today … is related to airlines making their own individual decisions about where their aircraft are placed throughout the world and how they are best going to recover those aircraft as and when the snow falls, and whether they can even get them out of the other airports," she said.

The spokeswoman said it was "a myth" that other airports did not experience disruption due to the snow, adding that Munich, Geneva and Frankfurt were all experiencing significant disruption and that 40% of flights out of Paris were already cancelled on Sunday.

"What Heathrow is experiencing is absolutely in proportion to what other airports affected by snow are experiencing."

The airport said it had invoked its Heathrow demand and capacity balancing group procedure for the first time and cancelled more than 200 flights to help ease congestion within the terminals and give travellers advance notice.

Heathrow said it would normally have aircraft arriving or departing every 45 seconds, but due to the low visibility it had to increase the space between aircraft. "At the moment that spacing is doubled and that's why we are running at a reduced capacity," it said.

The airport said that while it couldn't "clear up the sky" to improve visibility, its snow-clearing operations were running according to plan.

"At 11am we'll do a sweep of the runways. So we close one while we clean the runway, and then we swap them over … so again that is going to reduce capacity."

Southern trains will run an amended timetable on Monday because of forecast snow.

Freezing conditions have also prompted motoring organisations to issue warnings. Darron Burness, the AA's head of special operations, said: "With the snow compacting down and turning icy, we're likely to see treacherous driving conditions throughout the weekend. Any fresh snow on top will just add to the problems."

Sally Webb, a forecaster with MeteoGroup, said: "We expect it to remain cold and there to be snow or sleet for the next week in most areas.

"It will also be icy everywhere, especially with the snow melt, and temperatures are going to be no more than 1C, dropping below zero overnight."

Winter storm could leave six inches of snow

winter

 Winter storm raced through the Carolinas, southern Appalachians and Mid-Atlantic late Thursday and early Friday.

Snow was expected to stop accumulating by daybreak as the system moved off the East Coast and headed to the north Atlantic Ocean.

However, up to six inches of snow was expected from southern Virginia into northern North Carolina.

The storm was forecast to miss major cities from Washington, D.C. to Boston, but could clip Cape Cod with some minor accumulations on Friday morning.

Snow also fell in parts of Mississippi and Alabama with 6 inches recorded just to the east of Ackerman in central Mississippi.

Mississippi officials attributed one death to the storm Thursday. Police in Lowndes County said a 64-year-old man died when his car collided with a large tree that fell because the ground was too saturated to support it.

                                                                                                           By Michael Palmer & weather.com

Rare freeze coming to California

California

 A cold weather system in California is expected to push temperatures into the low 20s in the citrus-growing regions of the Central Valley Friday and Saturday nights, threatening crops in the state's major agricultural areas.

The cold snap is expected to last through the weekend.

Morning temperatures fell into the 20s and 30s in many areas, and much lower in the mountains. A low of 12 degrees was recorded in the Big Bear mountain resort east of Los Angeles.

In Sonoma County, homeless shelters started handing out extra warm clothes to protect people from below-freezing overnight temperatures.

Central Valley citrus growers watched as temperatures dipped into the 20s Friday. Napa, in wine country, and Sacramento, farther north, both recorded 27.

High temperatures in the Central Valley over the weekend were forecast for 50 degrees, according to the National Weather Service.

In the south, forecasters warned that a low pressure trough sinking over San Diego County and parts of neighboring Orange County could keep nightly temperatures below the freezing point in coastal areas, the low deserts and inland valleys, threatening orange and avocado orchards and other sensitive plants. The coldest nights were expected to hit Friday and Saturday.

Farmers prepared to pull out giant fans to circulate the air and keep it from settling on their citrus trees, said Eric Larson of the San Diego County Farm Bureau.

"These guys are going to be up all night watching thermometers," Larson said.

Workers at SeaWorld in San Diego planned to crank up the heat for their macaws, toucans and parrots. San Diego zookeepers were also heating rooms for chimpanzees, apes and other tropical animals.

"They'll probably be huddling together and not be in areas where people will be able to see them," zoo spokeswoman Christina Simmons said.

Authorities on Friday reopened a 40-mile stretch of a major highway north of Los Angeles — some 17 hours after snow shut the route and forced hundreds of truckers to spend the cold night in their rigs.

Related: Calif. highway shut down for hours by snow reopens

The California Highway Patrol shut the Grapevine segment of Interstate 5 on Thursday afternoon. Officers began escorting traffic southbound early Friday and then opened northbound lanes about an hour later.

The shutdown severed a key link between the Central Valley and Los Angeles.

"There must have been 1,000 Mack trucks lined up," said traveler Heidi Blood, 40.

Blood and her three youngsters had been visiting Orange County and set out at 4:30 a.m. for their home in Kentfield when they found the road closed.

"I usually watch the news but I went to a spin class instead. I learned my lesson," Blood said.

Blood had to give an insulin shot in the car to her 13-year-old blind, diabetic dog, Barney.

To pass the time, the family watched movies and read on their iPads, turning on the car every 30 minutes to use the heater.

"We're watching 'Nannie McPhee' in the car right now," Blood said. "I only have enough juice for another three hours."

The highway through Tejon Pass rises to 4,100 feet in the Tehachapi Mountains and frequently is shut down in winter by blowing snow and treacherous black ice on the roadway.