Not here its not!! 4inches of fresh snow fell in the night... another has fallen since 10am. The ride to work was GREAT!! All the car drivers are terrified of crashing, whereas I'm LESS worried about falling off- there's a soft layer of snow to land in! So I was probably the fastest moving person in edinburgh this morning.
No one could get out of our street this morning- its steep and ungritted, so cars couldn't do it. My mountain bike could tho. (Although, my car is now fixed, so I'm thinking I might leave it at work and collect it when conditions around the flat improve slightly).
I don't even have to worry about getting home- I've cycled in 10inch deep snow in Stirling, so if it looks like getting that bad I'll bugger off.
Atherton and Leigh and Swinton and Eccles and nearly Trafford are in the midst of a scary blizzard. It is the first time that I have driven in White out conditions where I can't see the road or the lane markings or the car in front. It also has to be the first time that I drove at 20mph on a dual carridgeway. The ABS saved me a couple of 'oh shit' moments aswell.
The only thing scarrier was joining a motorway when it was safe to drive at 10-15mph in terms of stopping but unsafe because the lane you were joining was doing 40mph. After joining it was okay because I could control the distance between my car and the car in front. This was much to the annoyance of the lorry driver who thought 60 in a blizzard was a good thing.
Home safe and sound (Stockport is all clear ATM) and I hope I don't have to do that again any time soon!
Mike wrote:Atherton and Leigh and Swinton and Eccles and nearly Trafford are in the midst of a scary blizzard. It is the first time that I have driven in White out conditions where I can't see the road or the lane markings or the car in front. It also has to be the first time that I drove at 20mph on a dual carridgeway. The ABS saved me a couple of 'oh shit' moments aswell.
Yup, just stopped about an hour ago. Not very good conditions and I'm driving in this tomorrow to Durham. I just hope it sorts itself out by 10am ish because I'm not setting off early in the hope that others help to clear it with the hear and the sun comes out.
"A word to the wise ain't necessary -- it's the stupid ones that need the advice." Bill Cosby
Oh, if you thought that was bad, trying driving to Durham, going on the M62 over the Pennines. Severe fog, couldn't see more than about 20 feet in front of me, the fast lane out of action, snow coming down, everyone going at about 30mph and I was stuck behind a lorry that was spraying all his slush on me. To say I was ''a little frazzled'' when I finally finished the 4 hour journey that usually takes me 2 hours is putting it mildly.
"A word to the wise ain't necessary -- it's the stupid ones that need the advice." Bill Cosby
Well, as far as Cumbria goes it's beginning to thaw a little, but the sleety snow is now back. Am nowhere near being snowed in though, but that's hardly a disappointment. Not sure if Nick's made it back to Aberdeen yet, looks like he was in Manchester for Christmas though.
Andy, that freezing fog looked pretty bad just looking at it, never mind having to drive in it. You and Mike are part way to becoming hardened winter drivers. Next stop: ice rallying in the cairngorms!
MORE snow fell in Edinburgh this morning only a couple of inches... the roads up here are AWFUL!! We nearly didn't make it to the supermarket (5mins in the car), because it landed so fast that the whole city turned white!
We're off to go for a wander in the winter wonderland this afternoon. Which will be fun, I dislocated my knee on saturday (accident at BJJ- nothing serious, I can walk again now... but it DID hurt LOTS!), so toddling around on snow and ice is less than perfect for me. I'm not going to let it stop me tho- strap it up n keep going! YAY!
Al is on the M6 now... hopefully he gets here by dark!!
BBC predicted heavy rain here over night... its -5C so guess what fell instead of rain. Yup, more snow. Its just started, so we'll wait till morning and see what its like out there. I need to go to the lab again for my last couple of hours of 2009, so it could be another interesting drive (Bex has banned me from cycling- apparently I've got a bad leg...)
Will update folk incase MrE, JohnSL or Liz need travel updates!
I loved the photo of the bike in the morning. That was impressive that you managed to find / extract / ride to work that day. I suppose you have a very important reason not to skip work whining 'I got snowed in'. (bugs and stuff would die!)
We've been slowly losing snow coverage for the last couple of days, not that it's gotten any warmer. Roads are still a little icy where they've escaped a proper gritting.
There appear to be some Edinburgh-based webcams that I had a quick look at. Makes it look fairly hospitable, but most of them do only show the main roads.
The light snow the BBC predicted for Stockport has actually been a snow storm that has dumped 2 inches of snow on my car. Just dug it out and it has now been buried again!
The M60 webcams don't show a pretty sight this morning. Sue has started off to work, as it seems the whole street is doing, but how far she'll get is another matter.
Well, we've had about 3 inches at least I reckon. It took an age to get rid of the snow from my drive.
Row's just been to the petrol station for some supplies and they've told her that the assessors have been out on the A580 because it is so bad and they're thinking of closing it. Apparently, everyone is going at 20mph and for some unknown reason created a path in the middle. Now that is something that even my gran has never witnessed!
It looks like the predictions of the man from Worsley at 7.15am are correct - who is this man? a random bloke I was talking to for about 20 minutes when I was getting rid of my drive.
"A word to the wise ain't necessary -- it's the stupid ones that need the advice." Bill Cosby
We had 2-3inches on Sunday night, and another inch today. Everyone is at work as normal- if you can get to a main road it'll be fine. I walked my bike to the top of our hill and rode in quite happily. Apart from frozen hands despite 2 pairs of gloves! and the fact that my gear cables appear to have frozen solid- only 1 gear on the way in today! Still, its better than driving.
Two hours and only half way to the Trafford Centre, Sue is now abandoning her attempt to get into work. So it will depend very much on where you are - don't assume all the main roads are free, because they are not.
An accident on the M60 will be taking its toll on many routes, plus some motorway junctions being closed.
