Our younger days - Winter memories......

[PB22]

Fascinating thread...thanks everyone for their excellent contributions, and I look forward to reading those to follow. :blink:

[Ledbury Lad]

Oh dear...I posted all the details for February 1963 earlier on and included some additional snippets taken from my weather scrapbook at the time when I cut out interesting items from the newspapers, local and national about the extraordinary cold and snowy winter. I don't know what happened, but it seems to have got lost!

I will have to do it again later today but not to worry.

Paul C: Lovely story...thanks! Yes, this country is now a totally different place and any (unlikely!) repeat of a similar winter again would cause absolute and complete shutdown of everything! It only takes an inch of (usually wet!) snow now for everything to seize up and we see a mad media frenzy. This country just could not take it I'm afraid, which is just as well those winters never happen now. Even the snow itself is different now...one thing I really remember about 1962/63 was that the snow was the soft, dry powdery stuff that really was hopeless to make snowballs as I recall. Also, it drifted so badly and didn't turn to slush and just became hardpacked on the roads. There was far less road traffic anyway. The good old railway locomotives of fond memory just whooshed through the drifts with the aid of the snowploughs attached to the front as a matter of course in winters then.

John: Look forward to seeing your records, grandad! ;-)

Two entries fom the abridged diaries of the late Kenneth Williams:

Sunday 30 Dec 1962: Central London

"A terrific snow blizzard started about 1 o'clock this morning and it was still raging when I started out to Louie's today at 9 o'clock. Even with drifts of over 1 foot on the roads, the buses were RUNNING! The London buses are just INCREDIBLE: wonderful crews, all of them!"

Monday 12 January 1987: Central London

"I found Lou has no cold water to bathroom! Something is frozen in the pipe...Well, it is the first time it has happened in 21 years! I have never known such cold as this! It makes the ears sing with pain!"

That cold spell in Jan 87 really was bitterly cold. As was the whole of February 1986.

I will try again with the Feb 63 do-dahs!

Cheers

LL

[johnholmes]

hi all

well i've just spent one hour retyping all the stats up in word, only to discover that this forum will not accept columns of figures in the order i put them in, so back to the *****y drawing board. I will get them on here eventually.

[Ledbury Lad]

Second attempt.....first one went into orbit somewhere.

FEBRUARY 1963

Date Max C Min C Preciptn. mm Weather

(*=snow)

Fri 01 -0.3 -3.4 1.3* Strong NE wind; snow on and off

Sat 02 -2.4 -7.2 0.7* NE gale; heavy drifting snow at times

Sun 03 0.5 -6.9 1.8* Snow on and off all day Dull

Mon 04 -1.8 -10.3 1.6* Snowfall with drifting windy

Tue 05 0.4 -2.8 6.3* Blizzard during night; SE strong

Wed 06 1.6 -2.2 2.9* Snow; windy at times E

Thu 07 1.3 -2.6 0.3 Snow turning to sleet at times

Fri 08 3.3 0.0 Sunny at times

Sat 09 1.7 0.1 Tr Slight snow/freezing rain

Sun 10 -2.3 -2.8 Heavy snow pm; N

Mon 11 -0.1 -3.6 Slight snow/sleet

Tue 12 2.8 -1.8 Tr Slight snow/sleet

Wed 13 2.2 -5.3 Tr Some snow am Dull

Thu 14 1.1 -3.9 Dull and cold

Fri 15 2.0 0.6 0.4* Snow and sleet at times

Sat 16 0.4 -2.8 Mostly sunny

Sun 17 1.4 -1.9 Brilliant sunshine

Mon 18 1.7 -5.3 Brilliant sunshine cold SE wind

Tue 19 -0.9 -2.6 Sunny and bitterly cold E wind

Wed 20 2.1 -4.7 Very cold wind

Thu 21 3.9 -3.9 0.6 Foggy at times; snow

Fri 22 3.2 -1.7 7.6* Heavy snowstorm overnight

Sat 23 0.6 -4.2 Dull and very cold

Sun 24 -2.3 -7.8 Bitterly cold; freeezing fog

Mon 25 0.1 -10.1 Severe frost; freezing fog; Rime

Tue 26 3.2 -7.6 Sunny after fog

Wed 27 2.3 -5.5 Sunny at times

Thu 28 5.1 -3.3 Milder with sunshine

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Average max temp: 1.1C

Average min temp: -4.1C

Mean temp: -1.5C

Highest max temp: 5.1C 28th

Lowest min temp: -10.3C 4th

Rainfall total: 26.7mm (snowfall equivalent)

Number of air frosts: 25

Days with 100% snow cover: 28

LL

[Ledbury Lad]

1962/63 WINTER

I won't post the March 63 weather as the cold began to lessen during the first week although there were severe frosts on the first four nights. Then it was back to normal at last, and by 06 March 63 the snow that had been on the ground since 26 Dec 62 finally disappeared except for remains of drifts by walls and hedges that took ages to finally melt away altogether. Snow covered the ground for 69 consecutive days.

I cut out loads of weather stuff out of the national and local newspapers during the winter.

30 DEC 62: Orpington train station Kent - aerial view: snow drifted up to level of platforms.

28 DEC 62: Postman knee deep in snow delivering mail in Kent

31 DEC 62: Car ploughing its way through churned up snow in Piccadilly Circus

31 DEC 62: AA reports "The Greatest Avalanche of snow since 1881 has blocked thousands of miles of main roads in Britain".

31 DEC 62: A road sign almost completely buried in deep snowdrifts near Plymouth yesterday after the blizzard which brought the worst winter weather in memory in the SW.

01 MAR 63: A man shoveling away at 18 inches of frozen snow blanketing Cheltenham Racecourse on 28 Feb 63 in the hope that the course would be ready for a meeting 11 days later. A picture of optimism! Actually it did clear by then at last.

Football Association in the UK suffered worst setbacks in it's history.

WALES: 01 MAR 63: Major crisis! No daffodils anywhere apart from hot-house varieties. Trees did not leaf until late May 63.

CAMBRIDGE: 18 FEB 63 Students take short cut by walking along the frozen River Cam

HEREFORD: "That's not a snow covered street...it's the frozen River Wye near the Old Bridge!"

KENT: Ice floes along the coast

31 DEC 62: Part of the main Editorial in the Daily Telegraph:

SNOW BLINDNESS

With a fine feeling for the just phrase, officials of the Automobile Association described yesterday as a "Siberian Sunday". Unfortunately we are living not in Siberia but in Britain and once again we greet with angry surprise a type of weather which is surely frequent enough to justify the maintenance of equipment to counter it. The chaos, especially in the West Country and in Kent has been grim indeed. Train services have been severely cut, or altogether abandoned. Orpington has distinguished itself for the second time this year - on this occasion, by losing all railway contact with the rest of London and Kent. Drifts of eight, nine and 10 feet have blocked main roads, and in many areas in Britain driving conditions have been described as impossible. There has ben widespread failure of electricity.

The severe intensity of the blizzard that has swept Britain may have been quite exceptional. Later it may prove to have justified an early comment that "never in the living history of Southern and Western districts and the Midlands has there been such an avalanche of snow". Snow, if not exactly an avalanche, is to be expected in every English winter."

The rest of the editorial just describes the difficulties in being prepared for snow and local authorities acting swiftly enough to mitigate the disruption, but that particular blizzard was just so overwhelming.

Interesting that bit about "snow is to be expected in every English winter"! And that "this type of weather is frequent enough to justify..etc..". Definitely no longer the case.... 41 years later in a different climatic scenario.

LL

[johnholmes]

hello at last,

thank you LL for a great 'picture' of your memories of that memorable winter. As has been said it got to the point where one longed for it to end.

Here are my memories for the 1962-63 winter at a Royal Canadian Air Force Base at Langar, about 10 miles SE of Nottingham.

I hope this now comes out as I find how this site arranges data very confusing. I've tried its original Excel, then word in tables, now this way. Please take time to go through it and please excuse any errors as its all had to be re-entered several times!

I may do my recollections as a kid of 1947 but no data for that!

Data for RCAF Langar for the 1962-1963 winters, with a comparison with 1947

Langar is about 10 miles ese of Nottingham in a slight ‘bowl’ with minor hills all around it. The diary as such starts on December 26th 1962 and finishes at the end of February 1963. It did on a number of occasions appear in the Daily Weather Report(DWR) as the coldest place in Britain(not just in this winter)

General notes

The ground was snow covered continuously (Met Office definition for =/>half cover) for 44 days from 26.12.62 until 8.2.63

(At my parent’s house near Chesterfield, Derbyshire that was extended until 27th February,

A total of 63 days).

The ground at Langar was continuously frozen from 22nd December 1962 until 4th March 1963, a total of 63 days.

There was an air frost on every night, apart from 4, between 22nd December 1962 and 4th March 1963. (The only nights without frost were; 5.6.28 and 29th January)

There were 32 consecutive nights with frost from 1st February 1963 to 4th March 1963.

General notes on rainfall:

And there was a continuous frost(air temperature constantly below 0C) from 1500Z on 18th January 1963 until 0900Z on 26th January 1963(186 hours); put another way, almost a WHOLE week!!

There was 3.73 inches of rain (and melted snow) from 1 October 1962 to 28 February 1963

This = 38% of the average.

Monthly figures for the start of the cold spell on 22nd December 1962

Date min max mean

22 -4.4 2.2 -1.1

23 -6.1 0.6 -2.8

24 -9.3 0.0 -4.7

25 -11.8 -3.9 -7.9

26 -11.1 2.2 -4.5

27 -1.4 1.1 -0.2

28 -7.7 -2.2 -5.0

29 -5.1 -1.7 -3.4

30 -1.7 0.0 -0.9

31 -0.6 0.6 0.0

Mean temp for 10 days = -3.0C

Values for January 1963

Date min max mean

1 -0.1 0.7 0.3

2 -1.3 -0.6 -1.0

3 -0.7 0.5 -0.1

4 -0.1 1.0 0.5

5 0.6 1.1 0.9

6 1.1 1.8 1.5

7 -3.5 1.3 -1.1

8 -5.7 0.7 -2.5

9 -8.0 1.3 -3.4

10 -6.6 1.5 -2.6

11 -10.4 -5.0 -7.7

12 -5.4 -3.3 -4.4

13 -8.3 0.0 -4.2

14 -1.4 2.8 0.7

15 -7.7 2.3 -2.7

16 -2.7 0.0 -1.4

17 -9.2 -2.1 -5.7

18 -13.8 0.9 -6.5

19 -5.9 -0.3 -3.1

20 -3.3 -0.8 -2.1

21 -4.1 -1.4 -2.8

22 -13.6 -3.4 -8.5

23 -15.4 -3.3 -9.4

24 -12.2 -5.6 -8.9

25 -8.6 -0.6 -4.6

26 -6.2 5.3 -0.5

27 -3.9 2.3 -0.8

28 0.5 2.4 1.5

29 1.4 2.9 2.2

30 0.1 1.3 0.7

31 -1.7 2.5 0.4

Mean temp for month = -2.4C

Values for February

Date min max mean

1 -3.5 -0.7 -2.1

2 -9.8 -3.5 -6.7

3 -6.7 -4.1 -5.4

4 -10.2 1.6 -4.3

5 -8.4 0.2 -4.1

6 -3.7 -0.7 -2.2

7 -1.6 1.6 0.0

8 0.0 2.9 1.5

9 -1.7 2.9 0.6

10 -1.4 1.7 0.2

11 -1.8 0.6 -0.6

12 -0.1 2.1 1.0

13 -0.7 4.1 1.0

14 -2.6 1.7 -0.5

15 -0.1 1.2 0.6

16 -1.9 0.4 -0.8

17 -1.7 1.7 0.0

18 -1.7 2.2 0.3

19 -1.5 0.3 0.6

20 -4.8 2.6 -1.1

21 -3.9 4.1 0.1

22 -2.1 2.8 0.4

23 -2.8 1.9 -0.5

24 -6.7 0.6 -3.1

25 -9.8 2.2 -3.8

26 -5.2 4.8 -0.2

27 -4.6 2.8 -0.9

28 -3.3 5.4 1.1

Mean temp for month = -1.1C

Mean temp for January and February = -1.7C

Comparison of temperatures at Langar between 1947 and 1963

Year Month Avge min Avge max Mean Jan/feb mean

1947 January -1.0 3.5 1.3 1947=-0.5

1963 January -5.0 0.2 -2.4 1963=-1.6

1947 February -4.2 1.5 -2.3

1963 -3.7 1.8 -0.9

So for the two months being compared 1947 showed a mean temp of -0.5 and 1963 gave -1.7C

I cannot get data for frosts and snow for 1947 but for 1963 these were;

days with snow falling= 20 in Jan and 19 in Feb; lying snow=31 in Jan and 19 in Feb.

Air frosts in January were 26 and 28 in February.

I do remember catching 2 sometimes 3 buses to get back to my parents house. The old style double deckers with a minute so called heater at the front. Then trying to keep warm at their house, with just coal fires and no bedroom heating. With the Canadians there was central heating, so hot I only had ONE sheet on and the window open in my bedroom!

happy memories

I hope you all enjoy.

John

Edited November 24, 2004 by johnholmes

[johnholmes]

where has this been moved to please?

[Ledbury Lad]

Thanks a lot for those stats, John, and your hard work. It's really great to be able to compare them with mine. I really don't think I would like to go through a winter like that again...must be the age I am now! I could face anything back in 1962....!

You deserve to be treated to a pint now! My call!

Cheers

LL

[Terminal Moraine]

Big thanks indeed to L.L and John for taking the trouble to transcribe that lot, fascinating stuff.

It makes me wonder what the conditions were like where I live. We certainly wouldn't have experienced the very low minima but the daily maxima would have been interesting.

The data for February 1986 here make interesting reading, I'll attempt to put them on the board tomorrow.

T.M

[johnholmes]

Hi Tm

look forward to that and tks for the kind comment.

[johnholmes]

Hi LL

I've just been in the pub with a pal and been trying to explain just what it was like to experience Ms 15C, and also to have almost a whole WEEK with temps NEVER(excuse the capitals) even reaching zero deg C. We get really excited if it now stays below freezing for a couple of days, and if it snows as well --!!

Like you LL I would not want 65 days of snow cover thank you very much. I will eventually put together something about 1947, I was but a little lad then honest!

Again like you say LL it really is interesting to compare your figures with mine. Thanks a lot for your work too.

cheers

[Terminal Moraine]

Right, here goes with the Feb' 1986 data, recorded at 330mts in the southern Peak District of Derbyshire.

The figures are daily max, daily min and mean depth of lying snow at 0900.

1 0.2 -0.9 14 NE gale, light snow and freezing drizzle. Gust of 88 mph

2 -0.2 -0.6 20 NE gale, light snow and freezing drizzle, drifts to 2m

3 0.0 -1.0 27 Thick freezing fog and light drizzle or snow

4 -0.7 -1.6 27 Thick freezing fog and drizzle. Glaze and rime 7cm thick

5 -1.0 -4.3 29 Moderate snow and f5 NE wind. Thorn trees bent double and

welded to snow surface due to weight of glaze and rime

6 -2.8 -5.5 29 Snow showers and f5 NE wind. Drifts 1-3m deep

7 -2.7 -4.3 29 Light snow showers and sunny intervals

8 -2.0 -4.3 32 Snow showers and f4 NE wind, more drifting

9 -1.1 -4.2 31 Dull, light wind and occasional light snow

10 -3.6 -8.3 31 Sunny after thick freezing fog a.m

11 -1.5 -5.5 30 Dry and cloudy

12 -2.6 -4.4 29 Freezing fog and f4 SE wind

13 -0.4 -5.2 30 Sunny, f5 NE wind. Last of glaze and rime fell from trees

14 -3.0 -4.4 28 Dull and windy with light-moderate snow, further drifting.

15 -2.1 -3.8 27 Cloudy with f5 E wind, drifting snow

16 -1.9 -3.1 27 Dull, intermittant light snow and drifting

17 -1.2 -3.6 27 NE gale, light snow and drifitng

18 -1.6 -2.7 25 Snow showers and f5 E wind, more drifting

19 -1.2 -4.2 26 Sunny periods and snow showers

20 -1.1 -5.3 26 Sunny periods after freezing fog. NW wind

21 -2.9 -8.0 26 Sunny periods

22 -1.5 -6.5 26 Sunny with f4 NW wind

23 -2.6 -5.6 26 Sunny spells, snow showers, f4 E wind, more drifting

24 0.7 -4.6 25 Sunny, light snow showers, first day above 0c for 23 days

25 -1.8 -4.7 25 Sunny intervals and snow showers, f4 E wind

26 -2.9 -6.7 27 Sunny, f5 E wind, light drifting

27 -1.8 -6.0 27 Sunny, f6 E wind, drifitng snow

28 -0.1 -3.3 25 Sunny, f7 E wind, drifting snow.

Mean max' -1.6c, mean min -4.6c. Rainfall (all snow or freezing drizzle) 41.6mm 21 days snow falling, 28 mornings snow lying.

The coldest Feb' since 1947 and second coldest of the century

T.M

[Terminal Moraine]

I should have mentioned, snow depth is in cm.

T.M

[johnholmes]

very impressive, or 'orrible, depending on one's love or hate of bitter cold and snow. Just where in the Peak District do you live? Your figures are nearly as bad as mine for Feb 1963 and that was an incredible winter. Well it was on low ground and even more so about 500 feet up at my parent's house. I shudder to think what your conditions would have been like in the winter of 62/3. Have you got any idea, from any other source perhaps?

cheers

[Terminal Moraine]

Hi John,

I'm on Middleton moor, it's about 17 miles SE Buxton and about 5 miles SW of Matlock.

The best indication I can get of the conditions in 1963 is to look at the Buxton record, my max' are slightly lower than there's on average and minima rather higher as they are in a hollow surrounded by land up to 450m or so. I'm on top of an exposed plateau and never experience exceptionally low minima.

The Jan and Feb' mean temp at Buxton in 1963 were -2.9c and -2.7c respectively, unfortunately I don't have the daily data.

The mean in Feb' 1947 was -3.8c, I think ours would have been about

-4.0c as it is this type of month ( dull, cloudy, E wind ) which gives us our lowest temperatures rather than anticyclonic months such as Jan' 1963.

I do know from talking to elderly villagers that in Feb' 1947 some people dug tunnels through snow up to 5m deep to access their front doors. I can quite believe this as in Jan' 1979 I had snow higher than the top of the back door of the house after one single blizzard.

T.M

[johnholmes]

Hi Tm

tks for that, yep know the area, walked, biked in my younger days around there. It sure is pretty exposed. Talking of digging tunnels as a kid I do remember 1947. We had an outside loo, several mornings my father had to dig a way to it from our back door, only a matter of 2-3 yards along the same wall, and it was quite often way above my head. The house faced north with a sort of open box on 3 sides with houses, so with anything from the north or north east it just used to swirl around and plaster all the back of the house. A pity no one ever took photos in those days.

cheers

[summer blizzard]

Sadly, i am only 15 years old and have therefore never seen more than a foot of snow.

[Stepsan]

Hi all,

well i can see by the way you all talk that im not the only complete weather nut that i used to think.

I have great and very vivid memories of the great winter of 1962/63.

For a boy of ten it was very exciting,not only for the weather, but because i was off school for six weeks as the boilers froze solid.

I live in the Chilterns and remember well that Boxing Day afternoon when it started snowing. It was about 3 or 4 pm. It snowed steadily all night and all next day on the 27th till late in the day. There was very little wind so the snow had not drifted much. But on the 29th it started snowing again and this time we had a howling easterly wind.The snow was very powdery, as i know now, a common characteristic of very cold easterlies.In the 60,s there were no street lamps on after midnight so you could not use the lamps to see if it was still snowing.

I could hear that unmistakable sound of clouds of very fine snow grains being blown into the windows of my Prefab. I did manage to get some sleep that night.

When i got up in the morning and looked out of the window the snow was level with my windowsil being about 3 ft off the ground. When i got up and walked down my hallway there was a small snowdrift INSIDE by my frontdoor which faced east.

The wind had driven the powdery snow through little cracks in the door.

I can also remember another snowstrom on 19th-20th of January and this time we had some freezing rain after the snow for a time. The snowdrifts were easily 8 -10ft deep in places.

1969 was also full of memories for me as i was due to leave school in the April,but february was a very snowy month with some good northerly blasts and amazing

polar lows.

For me though any extreme weather event is exciting especially severe thunderstorms, and had some close shaves with lightning too!

good times for me.

Regards,

Stephan.

Edited January 9, 2005 by Stepsan

[Methuselah]

Here's one I recall: February 1979!!!

http://www.wetter-zentrale.de/topkarten/tkreaar2.htm

[cheeky_monkey]

i was born in 1966. so i was a child of the 70s a teen in the eighties and an adult from 90s onwards.

i spent the 70s in exeter and didnt think it eva snowed in the winter apart from odd showers until we got snowed in big style in feb 1978.

Then got some very hefty frequents snowfalls in 1978-79 winter which was magic for a 12yr old.

it happened again in 1981-82 with some great snowfalls again.

Then frustration set in as during the mid 80s we missed out on a lot of snowfall that hit the country in exeter was just very cold and mainly dry.

i moved to essex in late 86 so was lucky to experience the snows of jan 87 and feb 1991.

There the story ends i havnt seen a decent snowfall since. But there is light at the end of the tunnel cuz im emigrating to canada in september!

[summer blizzard]

As i am only 17 i do not have many memorable winter memories however i do remember the winter of 1996 having a lot of lying snow as well as the April snow of 1998, i also remember quite a few snow events during the winter of 2001, however my faviourate was February 2005, we had snow showers for two weeks, i find it quite ironic really, while many people say the February 2005 event was mild and snowless, i will remember it as one of the coldest and snowiest times of my life.

[Isolated Frost]

Having been born in 1972, I was too young to remember the largely snow free winters of the mid-1970s, but remember 78/79 and then all the winters since then.

I feel sorry for snow lovers who are 26 and under, as following the major pattern change that has occurred in the British weather over the last 15 years, it is very unlikely that we will see anything like the 1978 to 1987 era again.

There were what I would call 'major' snow events every winter, with the possible exception of 79/80. The sort of 'events' that we now see in winter that get people into frenzy would also occur but you wouldn't remember them because there would be much greater snowfalls in the same winter.

Most people will be old enough to remember the two major snowfalls of 95/96. The 78 to 87 period was the same but with, on average, three major snow events each winter and with longer cold spells.

Ahhh... closure.

[Snowstorm1]

Lol Isolated Frost that made my day! :lol:

[Aaron]

Ahhh... closure.

[Teesdale]

Ahhh... closure.

I'd rather have had several of the 70/80's winters than the last few. Esp 1978/79 the depth of snow far exceeded recent winters in this area. One element that has been missing from the recent cold winters are blizzards.