Tuesday - November 25, 2008

Where is Al Gore?

Reporters panic, forget how to count, how to tell time, and how to read thermometers!!

Snowstorm Disrupts Travel in Finland, Sweden, Russia
By Juho Erkheikki and Niklas Magnusson

Residents in Sweden, Finland and Russia were left stranded and without power for a second day as the year’s first winter storm pummeled northern Europe.

Flights were delayed in Helsinki and Stockholm as northern winds forced airports to shut runways. Snow blanketed the region and the wind blew what had accumulated since the storm hit yesterday. Thousands were without power.

The storm buried the region with up to 30 centimeters (11.8 inches) of snow, catching locals unprepared after last winter, the mildest on record. The bare ground then forced Helsinki and Stockholm residents to cancel outdoor activities such as skiing and sledding.

“This comes as a real surprise,” said Tomas Lindberg, 36, as he dug out his car in Helsinki and tried to get to work. “I had to fetch my snow shovel from the attic.”

Weather apocalypse hits Europe
An enormous cyclone has wreaked havoc across Europe from Scandinavia to the Balkans, bringing snow gales and claiming lives. In Russia, weather surprises during the weekend started with beating two climate records, for warmth and low atmosphere pressure, and ended with a tempest and heavy snow which brought destruction and left more than 130,000 people without electricity.

This weekend marks a rapid halt to the abnormally warm weather which lasted in western Russia for most of November.

Moscow and St Petersburg suffered the worst because of the gale, where heavy snowfall along with strong winds have killed one person and injured several others.

A man died in St Petersburg while sitting in his car when it was hit by six trees felled by the wind. 

UK brought to standstill as five inches of snow falls in an hour

Severe weather warnings were issued by the Met Office for much of the south east of England, the east of England, the East Midlands and Yorkshire, with the freezing temperatures and heavy snowfall prompting fears of traffic chaos.

The heaviest snowfall was in Aberdeen, where 14 centimetres (5.5ins) of snow fell between Saturday and Sunday. Norfolk and Lincolnshire were the most affected places in England, with up to five centimetres (2.4 ins) falling in just one hour.

The lowest weekend temperature was reported in rural Oxfordshire, where it sank to -21F (-6 C) overnight on Saturday. With gritters and snow ploughs out in force, most major roads remained open, although the going was slow on minor roads and police received a high volume of calls reporting minor accidents.

Even worse than the mayhem caused by a few inches of snow, every top football team in the UK go shut out this week!

England
The top five all scored a huge blank over a dull Premiership weekend. Fulham held Liverpool to a hard earned 0-0 draw at Anfield. Manchester United and Aston Villa drew a blank at Villa Park and Chelsea did the same at home to struggling Newcastle United.

Meanwhile Arsenal had a worst weekend losing 0-3 at Manchester City. All in all though it was a pretty much a non eventful weekend.

Several good little euro-socialists are displaying their capitalist roots

Both of Andorra’s ski areas opened at the weekend with up to a metre of fresh snow on upper slopes, which some resorts are claiming is the best snow conditions they’ve seen in 40 years.

On the Spanish side of the border Baqueria Beret, one of the country’s three largest resorts, also opened. All three resorts and a dozen others in Spain, several of which – including Formigal and Sierra Nevada - had already opened a week ago, are opening at least a week ahead of schedule.

On the French side of the Pyrenees, home to another few dozen ski areas, resorts are sticking more closely to their planned opening dates despite huge falls there, with ST Lary at one point reporting the biggest snowfall in Europe.

However a second major French ski area has opened, joining Tignes which has already clocked up two months of its 2008-9 season having opened in September. Val Thorens, Europe’s highest ski resort, opened on Saturday with an extensive ski test.

on the minus side, the Spainish and Portuguese local fishing fleets are grounded until the weather gets better

In the northeastern region of Galicia the strong winds combined with waves of up to five metres had forced most fishing boats to remain at port while they waited for better weather conditions.

Meteorologists predict the rough weather, which began on Monday, will last until at least on Friday.

Here’s one of those silly maps that are only good for showing on TV with a pretty blonde in front of waving her hands around:

It looks like somebody crying and they have Spain running out of their nose, which could really hurt.

Posted by Drew458     on 11/25/2008 at 05:28 PM   
Filed Under: • Climate-Weather •  
• Comments (1) • Trackbacks(0)  Permalink •  

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