PeteB

Large branch down across our lane and you're not seeing things, those are sheep.

One of the hazards of heavy snow...one of our 40 feet high conifers has just come down with the sheer weight of snow. Pete

Hearing that the A54 is blocked at Kelsall, East of Chester. Pete

Major traffic delays being reported in Wrexham, Chirk, A5 near Llangollen, Buckley/Mold area, Holywell and on The A55 at Rhuallt. Pete

Coming down at a crazy rate here, up to 6 inches now. I don't think I'm going to be able to get out of our lane today. Pete

Yes, very heavy snow, around 6 inches here so far and accumulating quickly now. Pete

Yeah, but 2 minutes before it was due to start I lost my satellite signal...darned snow . Pete

Still getting heavier...satellite signal lost a few minutes ago, so I may as well retire (after one last look outside) Pete

Bucketing down here just 10 miles to the west of Chester, 4cms already. Should be with you soon . Pete

Snow is getting heavier and heavier. Just braved the elements and can see it blowing off the roof. Wind has died down in the last few minuted, just the odd gust whipping the snow up. Pete

Snow Yes, it'll be pretty bad up there, my parents used to live in Llanarmon. Anyway it's stepped up a few gears here too, it's settling but I think at the moment the snow is a bit too wet to drift. Things may change though. Pete

First flakes of snow spotted, wind has picked up in the last few minutes, leaves blowing around all over the place. This is getting interesting. Pete

Still bone dry with a biting wind. It's not strong enough for a full blown blizzard at my elevation (350 feet) but I'd expect some of the higher areas like the Llandegla and Denbigh moors to see gigantic drifts in the next 24 hours. Leading edge of the snow is being reported to be around Wrexham so it may be here within the hour ! Pete

Looking forward to some decent snow at last. Wind is pretty strong too so we could see some moderate drifting. Pete

More snow on the ground up here than at any time since Feb 2007, around 5 inches. Only a very minor thaw just before it went dark, now its freezing quite hard, I have a temp of -2.0 right now. Pete

I think we are in a different universe up here. 6 inches on the ground now and the snow continues. I don't get it, we were in an orange warning area last Friday and got 2 inches, today there are no warnings here or anywhere near us but we've had over 4 inches of snow, go figure. Pete

Just over the border it's bucketing down with snow, I have 12cm's already, sky looks full of it too. Pete

Still coming down here and heavily too. Building up nicely , up to 12cms deep. Pete

Been snowing for quite a while here, 5cms in the last couple of hours. Pete

Still coming down here too. Pete

That's a good point, during the 62/63 winter I only had 2 days off school. I had to walk about three quarters of a mile on top of the hedgerows to just get to the school bus, one day it was simply impossible the next day the bus didn't turn up. I'm pretty certain that the school remained open on every day though. Conditions in the playground were treacherous but we still got sent outside at dinner time. I don't know what would happen these days as they close the schools if there's more than a couple of inches of snow for safety reasons, Pete

Interesting list, but none of those have produced a white Xmas around here, in fact I don't think I've ever seen anything more than a passing snow shower on XMas day since I got interested in the weather back in 1963. There has of course been snow lying at Xmas, probably around 10 times and the best was in 1981 when there was over a foot of powder snow on the ground but clear blue skies on the day itself. Pete

Yeah, I was 13 when it started and on my 14th birthday April 30th there were still patches of snow left in a few ditches. In actual fact there weren't that many snow events, the first one on Boxing Day left about 6 to 8 inches of snow. Then two or three days later a bitter wind set in with more snow, heavy at times and with severe drifting and this lasted for what must have been 10 days or so, although the snow only fell for a day or two. Drifts were enormous. Then there was a quiet period with bitter day and night temperatures. The next snow came in early February, a huge blizzard, the biggest I've ever seen, that started in the late afternoon and finished the next morning, this completely covered our driveway to a depth of 6 feet or so. Half term provided us with another moderate fall maybe 6 inches and that was almost the last of the snow. I say almost because on the day the thaw started we had a couple more inches before it turned to rain. Other memories were skating on a frozen lake in mid February and being able to walk on the usually fast flowing stream close to my house. It had frozen from bank to bank with just a trickle underneath the ice, that stream has never frozen since then. Also unique was the River Dee freezing solid at Queensferry although it did freeze higher up river in Chester 1981/2. The drifts also froze over and got quite dirty apparently from soot that came all the way from Russia. Funny thing was that having moved from Birkenhead to Wales in 1961 I thought this must be a normal winter up here (at 350 feet), we used to go to The Wirral most weekends and they only had a few inches of snow down there. Pete

On The Flintshire, Cheshire border the fields adjacent to the A55 now resemble large lakes, I estimate that the expanse of water reaches a mile in places. As it's pan flat and the water is held in by the Chester to Wrexham railway line these fields are not going to dry out quickly. Pete