Bbc4 1963 big freeze.

[Greythundercloudys]

No global warming in those days, my dad used to talk about that and 1947, said the drifts where up to the top of electric polls, 45 days of snow in Cornwall.

 

[topground]

In North Somerset it snowed on my birthday 27th December 1962 and there was still snow on the ground in May. Up the road from us they didn’t bother to clear the drifts that filled a sunken road filled as high as the hedges they just opened the gates to the fields either end and bypassed the drifts. Fires lit under lorries to thaw the diesel on Potters Hill on the A38. Somerset County Council spent a fortune on snow blowers and other equipment which rotted out before they were ever used. Mother turned the Bedford Dormobile onto its side going down the lane from the house to the metalled road in the drifts.
Walked to school through the drifts in short trousers.
All the press talk was of the coming ice age turns out it was just weather!

 

[Hilly]

No global warming in those days, my dad used to talk about that and 1947, said the drifts where up to the top of electric polls, 45 days of snow in Cornwall.

My dad said 63 was nothing compared with 47 .

 

[Gormers]

Started watching & soon as packman popped up he got zapped with remote
Repair shop miles better

 

[Baker9]

I can remember it starting to snow on Christmas night all night. There was a big snow drift in the yard outside the back door right across the yard to the shed where the car and the Dexta were so they were not out for a few weeks. I can remember Helicopters flying up on Sawel dropping hay for the sheep on the mountain and taking supplies to some of the farms on the high ground.
The drifts on the road were cleared using Barney Mullans big Dozer and the tracks were on the road for years afterwards when they dug it out of the Quarry probably a few weeks after and @Hilly you were right dad said afterwards 63 was easy compared to 47. I was five at the time so a lot of the details passed me by.

 

[Greythundercloudys]

Yee mine said that as well 1947, would be like back in the stone age, would make the beast from the east seem like a snow shower.

 

[Mur Huwcun]

I remember my grandparents mentioning ‘47 a few times when we were kids and something about walking to local town on the top of the railway line because of the telegraph poles or similar

 

[glasshouse]

I can remember it starting to snow on Christmas night all night. There was a big snow drift in the yard outside the back door right across the yard to the shed where the car and the Dexta were so they were not out for a few weeks. I can remember Helicopters flying up on Sawel dropping hay for the sheep on the mountain and taking supplies to some of the farms on the high ground.
The drifts on the road were cleared using Barney Mullans big Dozer and the tracks were on the road for years afterwards when they dug it out of the Quarry probably a few weeks after and @Hilly you were right dad said afterwards 63 was easy compared to 47. I was five at the time so a lot of the details passed me by.

47 was caused by all the smoke from ww2 i reckon

 

[Lazy Sod]

I shall remember it til the day I die, it was absolute hell.

The milk line in the parlour kept freezing up and I regularly gave up and milked the last 10 cows by hand. We had to drive drive through the fields with milk churns on a tractor and trailer to meet the lorry in the village. There was ice on the insides of the house windows.

We were down to only 1 water tap in the yard that would still run, so we put a long hose on it to take water round the sheds. It was rolled up at night and taken indoors to stop it freezing. The tap was left running 24/7. Water was free from the landlord in those days.

 

[Hilly]

47 was caused by all the smoke from ww2 i reckon

Y

I can remember it starting to snow on Christmas night all night. There was a big snow drift in the yard outside the back door right across the yard to the shed where the car and the Dexta were so they were not out for a few weeks. I can remember Helicopters flying up on Sawel dropping hay for the sheep on the mountain and taking supplies to some of the farms on the high ground.
The drifts on the road were cleared using Barney Mullans big Dozer and the tracks were on the road for years afterwards when they dug it out of the Quarry probably a few weeks after and @Hilly you were right dad said afterwards 63 was easy compared to 47. I was five at the time so a lot of the details passed me by.

my dad told me in the spring of 47 they went to the pub as it doubled as the shop , an old couple came in and were very grateful to get to the shop as been long winter things had got ruff they had eaten all the hens and had to also burn the hen house to survive but they had made it ! Folks were hard in them days .He also said they had bad lambing after the winter as what sheep were left were lean , and melt made land wet cold .

 

[Goweresque]

Here's the documentary without the autistic twit:

 

[Goweresque]

Weirdly enough just earlier this evening I watched this documentary about the very severe winter of 1949 in Wyoming USA:

 

[Chopsy Varmint]

Y

my dad told me in the spring of 47 they went to the pub as it doubled as the shop , an old couple came in and were very grateful to get to the shop as been long winter things had got ruff they had eaten all the hens and had to also burn the hen house to survive but they had made it ! Folks were hard in them days .

Rationing was still in place in 1947 too, including coal and clothes. And yet these days people think it's the end of the world if the boiler breaks down.

 

[Goweresque]

I often think that if we had a repeat of '47 or '63 the country would pretty much collapse. There just isn't the resilience built into society the way it was then. Everything runs on a knife edge. I'd hate to think what could happen, it could be really nasty.

 

[serf]

Would wipe out cv10 tho

 

[possumbility]

I was 4 years old, we had visitors for Christmas day I think they left midway through January.

 

[Hilly]

I often think that if we had a repeat of '47 or '63 the country would pretty much collapse. There just isn't the resilience built into society the way it was then. Everything runs on a knife edge. I'd hate to think what could happen, it could be really nasty.

Cloths heating machines all 100 times better now though it would never be as bad as back then in some ways but in other ways it would be much worse .

 

[Goweresque]

A good ITV report on the snow of 1982:

 

[shumungus]

2013 hit us hard here in NI. 22 March it landed right in the middle of lambing. Hit higher ground 4ft lying snow + 60mph winds on the second night left drifts up to 20ft. Department collected 44000 dead stock after it. Councils and transport agencies were beat after 3 hrs if it hadn't been for the farmers and the digger men it would have been even more horrific. Father said it was worse than 62 and on a par with 47.

 

[kfpben]

I often think that if we had a repeat of '47 or '63 the country would pretty much collapse. There just isn't the resilience built into society the way it was then. Everything runs on a knife edge. I'd hate to think what could happen, it could be really nasty.

I disagree actually. Machinery for snow clearing is far better now.
During beast from the east I cleared drifts in a couple of days with the jcb that would have cut the village off for weeks before telehandlers. Tractors and snowploughs also far more powerful.
We had drifts like the attached for miles around the village in 2018. First time the snow blowers had been used in many years.