Mike Machin

I thought they looked a bit fishy!

I'm in Upham!

You're very fortunate. I live in a rural area near Winchester and the village has no mains gas. I have no fireplace or wood burner, so rely entirely on electricity and the power is usually lost for a few hours with even moderate gales, with trees and branches in remote areas bringing down the power cables. It can often be difficult for the engineers to find the break as can involve walking the length of the line across field, through woods and over ditches and streams to find the break and then it's difficult to bring in the materials to make the repair. The longest break here was ten days about a dozen years ago, and in fact power was lost only three days ago with a local lightening strike! You'd be amazed at just how cold and miserable it is with no heat, hot food or hot water for a few days. Part of me is excited about the prospect of some interesting weather on Thursday and part of me is dreading the prospect of it being potentially cold and dark until after the weekend.

For those who dream of epic snowfall and a 'real winter' I would say, never give up! An account of the 1978 Great Blizzard across the south of England was published by Dorset Life in 2008: The blizzard that buried Dorset | Dorset Life - The Dorset Magazine WWW.DORSETLIFE.CO.UK This was in mid-February in an otherwise 'normal' winter. Keep smiling

So many people, especially those living in the far South of Central Southern England - I'm thinking particularly within say 15 miles of the South Coast, they are constantly hoping for the near impossible! Extremely cold and significantly snowy winters are more or less a three or four times in a lifetime event - we live in a mild cool maritime climate which is also largely protected by the UK landmass from any Polar Maritime incursions. I was talking recently to someone who had just returned to the England having spent many years living in Melbourne Australia and we got around to discussing the weather. He mentioned that whilst the summers were generally quite a bit hotter than here, the winters generally were not dissimilar to Southern Hampshire. The Melbourne Winter (June – August). Average temperatures range from 6.5 - 14.2°C (43.7 - 57.6°F), the weather is frequently cold and cloudy, and nights can be accompanied by frosts. All sounds very familiar! The difference is they are happy to just enjoy the winter and are not constantly disappointed when the near impossible doesn't happen.

My family are all from South Yorkshire - but I live in the South East. Weather events in the SE probably do get more coverage generally, but it's because they can affect far more people in a small concentrated area of population, London for example has almost nine million inhabitants alone, not counting the wider South East - nearly twice as many people in one city as say the whole of Scotland.

That looks worrying - I would imagine it will be in Antwerp by lunchtime!

Hi Stormforce-Beka, thank you for your welcome - I'm from just southeast of Winchester in Upham. Here in the Winchester area we are often quite lucky when it comes to snow compared with those just a very short distance south of here. In the past I have often Portsmouth in the rain, and arrived home to thick snow! It would be nice to see some of the white stuff before the spring kicks in.

I'm always amazed at everyone's expectation that Winter will deliver snowy frosty days. There will always be the exceptional winter period where a cold snap prevails, but one has to accept that climate change has had an enormous and increasing influence on temperatures in the UK already. The period 2010 - 2019 has been 0.9°C warmer than the previous average, with 2019 being a full 1.1°C warmer. With the climate warming further still, increases of this magnitude can make all the difference between cold rainfall/sleet and a heavy snowfall, or a frosty morning or merely a cold morning. I think everyone will need to re-adjust their expectations of Winter in the UK, which will almost certainly become somewhat milder and cloudier, with temperatures generally more benign as time goes on, with just the occasional really cold spell in each decade.

Let’s hope that any snow holds off until next winter, when by which time hopefully, the COVID situation will have improved. My poor exhausted partner works in the NHS, the last thing the NHS needs she says, is any disruption caused by snow this winter. It could literally make the difference between life and death for some people. However, next winter - bring it on!!

I can remember an similar occurrence down here in Southampton in around Feb ‘78 I think. I was at ArtCollege at the time and It had been bitterly cold for several days all week, with a hard frost most nights. Then on the Thursday evening a group of us decided to attend an evening lecture starting at 7pm, so we adjourned to the Student Union bar at around 5.30. When we came out at about ten to seven, felt much milder and was starting to rain. Sitting in the lecture theatre although there were no windows, I could hear the rain absolutely pouring down, and cascading from the guttering. After an hour or so, the sound of the rain diminished and then stopped. I thought no more of it, I just thought it would be very wet under foot on the walk back to the station after the lecture. However, when the lift doors opened in reception, the sight through the glass walling was astonishing, huge amounts of snow on the ground and a near white with falling snow. It was impossible to get home for two days!

I usually wait with excited interest and expectation for the snow, but this year, with the COVID vaccinations getting under way I’m hoping for an unusually mild and settled winter through until Easter to allow our wonderful NHS to undertake this vital task without any interruptions or difficulties due to inclement weather. Everyone will require two vaccinations, and missed appointments due to snow or flooding will play havoc with the process and will cost lives, and vaccines delayed by poor road conditions will cause suffering and potentially waste vital and precious life-saving vaccine. So for this year, let’s all hope that winter is a ‘non-event’. A warm settled winter will ensure more of us are around to enjoy a winter wonderland next year