Short Film Of Deep Snow - Wales 1982

[Pennine Ten Foot Drifts]

I found this short clip of the aftermath of the heavy snowfall of January 1982 around what was then my village, about ten miles inland from Aberystwyth. The middle part of the clip is of the main road, the snow must have been over ten feet deep in places. The snowhole was actually dug down into the drifts on the main road, before the JCB came through to clear the way, which exposed half the hole, (this was about four days after the initial fall - we were totally cut off until then, but it gave us time to dig some pretty deep holes !). An amazing time, and the best snow I have ever experienced.

(sorry about the 'Demo version' thing across it - it's taken from a much bigger family films DVD, and I don't have any software which will take a clip from a DVD movie, and this was the only one I could find on the web)

[Pennine Ten Foot Drifts]

137 downloads but no comments ? It is genuine I assure you, shot by my father using his trusty Super 8 cine camera, and recently transferred to DVD. I just wish he'd taken a lot more. For reference, the village is called New Cross, and the road is the B4340.

[ellobee]

I found this short clip of the aftermath of the heavy snowfall of January 1982 around what was then my village, about ten miles inland from Aberystwyth. The middle part of the clip is of the main road, the snow must have been over ten feet deep in places. The snowhole was actually dug down into the drifts on the main road, before the JCB came through to clear the way, which exposed half the hole, (this was about four days after the initial fall - we were totally cut off until then, but it gave us time to dig some pretty deep holes !). An amazing time, and the best snow I have ever experienced.

(sorry about the 'Demo version' thing across it - it's taken from a much bigger family films DVD, and I don't have any software which will take a clip from a DVD movie, and this was the only one I could find on the web)

I remember a major snowfall in Dublin in Jan 1982 it must be the same event I think it was around the 14th or 15th it snowed all day and then froze for about a week, we never had anything like it since

I found this on youtube

[The Calm before the Storm]

Amazing scenes! Thanks for posting that footage. I remember it well, I was 17 at the time and the school choir's Transit van got stuck in a snow drift on the way back from a concert!

Those were the days when we had proper winters.........Mind you I'm looking out of the window with heavy snow falling atm..... Ha, ha!

[osmposm]

I found this short clip of the aftermath of the heavy snowfall of January 1982.....

Wonderful, thanks for posting. Makes me wonder whether amongst the miles and miles of 8mm my father shot from the 50s to the late 70s there are snowfall shots - almost certainly, yes....and very probably of 62-63. At the moment it's all still on film, but perhaps some wintry scenes, if I can find them, are a good place to start the long process of transferring it all to DVD. There are even several tins of B&W centre-sprocket 9.5mm that I've never viewed among them, perhaps dating from the late 40s. If we all pray to the snow gods there might...just possibly...be some of 1946-7 (though I'm not at all clear when he first got a cine camera).

Ossie

[High Altitude]

Can you imagine the media histeria if we were to get a snow event like that now. Our molly cuddled (not sure i've coined the right phrase there?) society would go into melt down. Everything stops with just 1cm in recent years........well down here in the soft south that is. :lol:

[Pennine Ten Foot Drifts]

Wonderful, thanks for posting. Makes me wonder whether amongst the miles and miles of 8mm my father shot from the 50s to the late 70s there are snowfall shots - almost certainly, yes....and very probably of 62-63. At the moment it's all still on film, but perhaps some wintry scenes, if I can find them, are a good place to start the long process of transferring it all to DVD. There are even several tins of B&W centre-sprocket 9.5mm that I've never viewed among them, perhaps dating from the late 40s. If we all pray to the snow gods there might...just possibly...be some of 1946-7 (though I'm not at all clear when he first got a cine camera).

Ossie

Thanks for the comments - whilst it's not that easy (or cheap !) to transfer from cine to DVD, if you find hidden gems like this its well worth it. I've also got a couple of boxes of much older reels which were shot by my grandfather, but not having a projector makes it rather difficult to work out whats what. I expect there are many more people sitting on reels and reels of fascinating cine film from the last century, it'll be a shame if it all ends up being dumped.

[Optimus Prime]

Can you imagine the media histeria if we were to get a snow event like that now. Our molly cuddled (not sure i've coined the right phrase there?) society would go into melt down. Everything stops with just 1cm in recent years........well down here in the soft south that is. :lol:

That was across high ground, similar event happened in Feb 2005. It wasn't as bad as that at lower levels, but it was very cold.

Very nice video.

[keithlucky]

Amazing scenes! Thanks for posting that footage. I remember it well, I was 17 at the time and the school choir's Transit van got stuck in a snow drift on the way back from a concert!

Those were the days when we had proper winters.........Mind you I'm looking out of the window with heavy snow falling atm..... Ha, ha!

I remember it well started snowing 6pm saturday finished 6pm sunday!

[Pennine Ten Foot Drifts]

That was across high ground, similar event happened in Feb 2005. It wasn't as bad as that at lower levels, but it was very cold.

I think it was considerably more widespread and severe than the 2005 easterly OP, affecting large areas of Wales, the SW and the Midlands, with much heavier snowfall. Mind you, 2005 wasn't too bad - gave me some pretty deep drifts, as can be seen in my sig pic

I remember it well started snowing 6pm saturday finished 6pm sunday!

I seem to remember it was a bit longer than that. Here's the excerpt from the UK Weather History website which covers the event:

"The battle between very cold and mild air in the south led to blizzards; the Midlands and Wales had 30-50 cm of snow on the 8-9th with easterly gales. Many places were cut off (e.g. Torquay and Weymouth). Some drifts were 20' high. Lasting 36 hours, this was one of the most severe blizzards of the century across the Southwest and Midlands.Throughout the snowfall temperatures hovered around -3C."

If I remember rightly the huge pile of cleared snow you can see in the vid with my sisters climbing over it didn't completely disappear until March, and that was despite some pretty mild weather in February.