Record Lows Overnight In My Area... And Much Of The Northeast Us.

[Akasha72]

Akasha is so right - we just cannot cope with snow at all, everyone just panics.

 
we wouldn't have to if the councils did their jobs properly and kept all road routes gritted instead of just doing the bus routes and main roads 

 

[eaglesaquarium]

I've been seeing the pictures on the news ... Niagra falls looks amazing at the best of times but frozen ... it's AWESOME!
 
 
 
Good luck you guys in the States! You certainly do better than the U.K ... we get an inch of snow and everything stops!

 

Akasha is so right - we just cannot cope with snow at all, everyone just panics.

 
Some areas can cope, others cannot.  Some don't even flinch.  Syracuse/Buffalo, NY, parts of Wisconsin, Michigan, etc.... a foot of snow isn't even enough to cancel school.  BUT, those areas do have cancelled school if the temps are too low, because its dangerous to have kids waiting for the school bus.
 
 
I was actually expecting a delay the other day to give the sun a chance to come up for a bit... but no such delay took place.

 

[Akasha72]

I think in the U.K it's the Northerners that cope better - because it's normal. Anything south of Yorkshire and it becomes less normal to see snow and icey temperatures. The more North you live, the more extreem and colder the weather. I'm fairly close to the Pennines so it can be glorious sunshine where I live and you go 5 miles up the road and it can be blowing a gale and several degree's colder. Me and my Dad often say "t'weather can be totally diffrent t'other side 'o hill" (to those needing Yorkshire translation that's "the weather can be totally different on the other side of the hill"!!) Where we are we're in a slight dip and so if you go up the hill towards West Yorkshire it can be a completely different world 
 
I'm presuming all other countries have similar climates - area's where it's normal to be colder and more prone to snow, ice etc and area's where it's generally warmer and less prone to snow etc
 
My Dad is forever telling me I don't know what 'proper snow is'. He was born mid 30's and so saw one of the worst winters on record in 1947. He says he can still remember having to throw the shovel (a spade if you prefer) out of the 1st floor bedroom window so his Dad could dig his way to the front door when he came home from work. He said the snow was up to the bedroom windows! I've never known it like that. I think the deepest I've ever seen is probably about waist deep and that was in the Lake District when I was a kid - back in the 80's! (oh dear, I'm showing my age!)

 

[eaglesaquarium]

Well, you know the US spans the continent, so the climates basically run the full gamut. 
 
There's the NE which is deciduous forest with a lot of snow.
 
There the SE which is prone to hurricanes.
 
The midwest plains experience tornadoes.
 
The west coast has earthquakes.
 
The northern midwest gets horrible winters and hot summers.
 
Alaska is partially inside the Arctic Circle.
 
Hawaii is a tropical paradise.
 
SW is a death scape of a desert known as 'Death Valley' - one of the hottest/driest places on Earth.

 

[Akasha72]

thankfully our climate is much more forgiving ... at least for now anyway! We do still get droughts and floods and we've had earthquakes (normally about 3 or 4 on the ricter scale so fairly minor) We have huracaines and we're starting to see more and more tornados ... not on the scale you guys get but we are starting to see more. The climate is changing but then England was once a tropical country - fossils found at the coasts have proved that much. My area was forged by the floods from the ice age ... there are large boulders which originated in Scotland dumped all over this country so that just proves to me that our climate has been warming up and cooling down for millenia.
We are also starting to see wildlife that never used to be able to survive in our climate starting to survive here. I think I saw documented recently that some kind of shark that normally wouldn't stray into our cold waters had been spotted off our coast. It's all changing for all of us but we can't fight nature no matter how many electric cars we build or wind turbines we shove up. Mother Nature is in charge and there's nowt we can do about that 

 

[the_lock_man]

We had 2 earthquakes in 2 days a week or 2 ago. One was about 30 miles away from me (about 3.something on Richter), the other was further into the Midlands.
 
On the subject of tornadoes, the UK has the greatest concentration of tornadoes (touchdowns per km2) than any other country in the world.

 

[Akasha72]

there was a fairly big one near Nottingham about 5 or so years ago at about half one in the morning. That one woke me up ... I've never been so terrified in my life! I think that one was about 4.5 if I remember right. It was morning before I found out what had happened. I'm still amazed that we felt it so far away. I'm in the little spa town of Harrogate and we felt an earthquake from Nottingham ... that blew my mind! Nottingham is hundreds of miles away! I think it was the rumbling I heard that frightened me more than the movement, although it did feel like my bed had jumped from one side of the room to the other!
 
Thankfully I've only seen the tornado's on the telly. I've never seen one here

 

[BiggTexx]

We had about 3-4" of snow a few years ago in south Texas. Schools were canceled, businesses were shut down, people were dying in house fires caused by heaters overheating just trying to keep warm... Now, any time the Temps fall below 40f everyone freaks out and it becomes a "Winter Storm Warning".

 

[Akasha72]

3-4 inches is pretty normal for us in Yorkshire - but they do close schools and stuff. Some of that is because it's pretty rural out here and, as mentioned before, our council will only grit and clear main roads and bus routes. The rural roads used to be cleared by local farmers when I was a kid and the council paid them something as a thank you. They no longer do that now and so the farmers only turn out if their own movements are affected. If a school teacher lives in that rural area and they can't get out of their area to commute to where they work then schools etc have to close.
 
I remember some pretty deep snow from being a kid back in the 70's and 80's but then things became a lot milder and for a good 10-15 years we see maybe 2-3 inches - 4 being the maximum but about 4 years ago it surprised us with this
 

 
 
 
 
It was the coldest winter for 20 years. It didn't get above freezing at all for well over a week. There was a record low of -15 one night! I'm pretty hardy but I struggled with the cold that winter. Everything came to a stop, everyone was completely snowed in. My neighbours build an igloo and put a sign on it for rent 

 Typical Yorkshire humour!
This winter the deepest the snow has been has been about 2 inch and it didn't last long. It was snowing here yesterday though but it didn't settle. Weather forcast is saying it's going to be a cold weekend though so there's chance of some snow then. We shall see!

 

[BiggTexx]

I am not sure I (or anyone else in this area) could handle that much snow again.  The last time this area saw that amount of snow (3-4") was back in 1960 and 1940 before that.
 
I think we are more adapt to handling the hurricanes down here, although we have some rough times with them.  We lost our beach house (complete obliteration) when Ike came through, my mother lost a house when Katrina landed in Louisiana, flooded our house during Allison, had a house picked up off the foundation and moved 30' during Alicia...
 
The satellite images showing the aftermath of Ike are pretty intense.  I'll see if I can dig them up.

 

[Akasha72]

so you couldn't handle this then
 

 
 
This is the winter of 1947 that my Dad tells me stories of that I mentioned in a previous comment!
 
Here's another one! My Dad remembers his Dad having to dig his way into the house after work cos the snow was up to the top windows like in this photo
 

 
 
Men will do anything to get a pint 

 

[the_lock_man]

 
 
Thankfully I've only seen the tornado's on the telly. I've never seen one here

 
I've seen the start of a tornado quite a few times, out over the English Channel (I'm in Portsmouth), but not one that has actually touched down.

 

[BiggTexx]

so you couldn't handle this then

 
That would be a true statement! I did spend a cold few weeks during winter in the northern US.  6" of snow on the ground and steadily falling, temps in the single digits and we stayed in the outdoor hot tub most of the nights, drinking and watching it snow until early mornings.   
 
Had to defrost a few drinks in the tub actually!