What's new

Snow day

Gaelle

Gaelle

Well-Known Member
Pollywog
Joined
Jul 7, 2013
Messages
10,606
At the beginning of the week, it snowed: 5-6 cm. It's not particularly common anymore, so we're a little lost when it snows.
Our cars aren't equipped for it, so we can't go out. The school buses couldn't run, so the children didn't have school for two days.
The mountainous regions of France laughed at us.
What about where you live? Is snow common in winter ? If not, does your life come to a standstill until the snow melts ?
 
Snow is short lived when it happens here where I live. We don't get it every year. Most years when we do it's overnight, shallow and melted or rained away the following day. This year is one of those not normal years. We had and inch of snow last Thursday night that stayed on the ground for 4 days before starting to melt as it stayed below zero degrees. Last night we had heavy snowfall from early evening right through to the early hours. The snow is so deep out there that community centres, sports facilities and the local schools are closed. Joy and my husband went for a walk at 10pm last night during the snowfall to experience being out in it. Their 3 inch deep footprints can no-longer be seen.
 
We don't get snow at all where I live. Occasionally on the mountains about an hour's drive from us and super rarely on the top of Table Mountain. It never lasts long because the temperature doesn't stay low long enough.
 
We don’t get snow here in the desert but I grew up in New York and we’d have a snow day probably once a year. As a kid those days were so magical!
 
I live in Michigan and we get snow every winter, but it does seem like we get less than we did 10-20 years ago. We haven't had a white Christmas in a while, but we did get a bunch of snow from late November until just before Christmas which was fun. We don't have much left now and the last day or two it's been in the 50s (F) so that is unusually warm for January. We actually had a crazy thunderstorm last night and high winds here today. Then it's supposed to get cold again tomorrow and bring a little fresh snow.
 
Here in central Virginia we get snow very intermittently, like maybe two times each winter, and rarely more than a couple of inches. So, like your town, everything shuts down and people in northern states like New York laugh at us. But I appreciate the shutting down. Because schools shut down, I get an extra day off. I think we all -- adults and kids alike -- need more time off.
 
In the part of Germany where I now live, it snows occasionally, and when it does, it melts quickly.
 
We got snow here south of Atlanta, Georgia last year. They called snow days twice! It didn't seem like much snow to me, but people were abandoning their cars in the middle of the roads. We had to weave around cars to get home. Being from Utah where it snows and snows all winter long, it was weird to me that they would leave their cars and walk.

Atlanta had a snowmageddon several years back where hundreds of cars were stuck and blocking the freeways, so this past year they got a few plows and put down an ice melt pretreatment when snow was predicted. It helped some, but since most people don't know how to drive in it and don't keep good all season tires on their cars, it was still a mess.

I didn't realize how many hills and trees are here in Georgia. They block the sun making it hard for snow and ice to melt on the roads. We also get power outages when trees fall on the power lines from the weight of the snow and ice. I hope we don't get any snow/ice storms here this January or February.
 
Karen said:
I live in Michigan and we get snow every winter, but it does seem like we get less than we did 10-20 years ago. We haven't had a white Christmas in a while, but we did get a bunch of snow from late November until just before Christmas which was fun. We don't have much left now and the last day or two it's been in the 50s (F) so that is unusually warm for January. We actually had a crazy thunderstorm last night and high winds here today. Then it's supposed to get cold again tomorrow and bring a little fresh snow.
Click to expand...
Same for me in Ohio (about 2 hours south of the Michigan-Ohio state line. We had 5 inches in early December that was gone by Christmas. We also had a couple of 1 inch snowfalls including one on New Year's Eve.

I've lived thru blizzards including one in January of 1978 that shut down the whole state for several days. I lived in an apartment in Toledo and the bottom of my window was ground level. I couldn't see out my window and it was 6 days before I could get my car out of the parking lot.

Schools will close for bigger snowfalls since many of our buses drive country roads. Some small businesses will close but for the most part life goes on as normal.

Today's weather... 60F.
 
Climate change has sure made an impact in my lifetime- we used to get snow in late October & November consistently through April - snow that didn't melt. This year, we just had our first snowfall two days ago and it was less than an inch. We will still get more, and it always snows at least once in April, but it's not like it used to be when I was a kid, or even 15 years ago.
 
It does NOT snow here. It snowed in Miami once in the 70s and my mom loves to tell me about it. The highs are hovering around 80F and I am strongly considering not leaving the house today.

Both times I've visited my husband's family in Ohio, I wished for snow and ended up with blizzards. His grandma teases me now that I can stop wishing for snow.
 
Snow is very common here in the winter but we haven't had any at our house recently; just in the mountains. We just realized that our car tires are quite bald so we should probably get new tires before it snows or we'll be sliding all over the place.
 
Snow from November to March (or even April!) is pretty much the norm here in Ottawa, Canada. 5-6 cm would be considered a minor inconvenience, nothing to worry about.

(That said, the older I get, the more I dream of retiring to a place like, I dunno, the Florida Keys, or maybe Costa Rica. Imagine sunshine and no snow plows!)
 
We get a pretty good snowstorm once or twice a winter, not enough for people to learn how to drive in it, so we do shut down. The bad thing is here it is more likely to rain and then freeze, so we get ice storms. That heavy ice takes down tree branches, power lines, makes the roads impassable, very dangerous. One year it was so bad, the ice so thick, I saw a kid skate by with his hockey stick! LOL
 
We had a few snowy days this week... it was beautiful and fun for the kids...
In the area where I live, the snow is already gone...
We don't have snow every year either...
 
No snow here ever, it's more likely to be foggy, frosty & rainy before I see any snow. In fact in 38 1/2 years, I've only seen snow three times - once when at Whistler B.C. which was my first time ever & twice as I was traveling through the North Island of New Zealand which is about 4-5 hours south of where I live)
 
We get snow on and off from Dec-Feb for the most part. Occasionally in Nov and March, but not very often. It's really mountainous and curvy around around here, so just a few inches can significantly slow things down and close schools. I wouldn't drive a car that's not all wheel drive or four wheel drive because there are times I couldn't get out of my driveway without it, even in only a couple of inches, because it's uphill. Within half a mile of my house, it's up 3 steep hills and down 2 really curvy hills. I hate snow.
 
We get snow, but like Karen said it's less than it used to be here in Iowa too. Although this year has been more snow early in the season than usual (18" so far), so it might be a heavier year. We have enjoyed a lot of warmer days though too - unseasonably warm and above freezing so it melted. Although we have had that much snow, there has only been one day of cancelled school when we got 10" in the same day, so life mostly goes on. There have been a couple of days that caused people to alter plans due to slick roads, but not a ban etc. just for comfort and safety. Really ice is worse than snow for keeping people home, unless they can treat the roads, but when it's too cold or starts as a heavy rainfall, they just can't put the brine on the roads to assist in melting it.
 
We have had exeptionally little snow this year. We have gotten a few inches now this last week. Right now we have about -4 degrees fahrenheit (if google calculates correctly) so it's too cold to snow, but I'm glad we have some. The cold is much more bearable when it's snowy vs bare.
Never in my life have I had a snow day :giggle I guess we are well equipped for it here
 
Meliora said:
We have had exeptionally little snow this year. We have gotten a few inches now this last week. Right now we have about -4 degrees fahrenheit (if google calculates correctly) so it's too cold to snow, but I'm glad we have some. The cold is much more bearable when it's snowy vs bare.
Never in my life have I had a snow day :giggle I guess we are well equipped for it here
Click to expand...
Here is is usually due to the temperatures being too cold rather than the snow. The fuel risks freezing in the school buses or the risk of skin exposure for frostbite is too high (wind chills -20'F).
 
Back
Top