Severe Winter Weather, Snow/Ice - Sun 25th Feb (Onwards) ** READ MOD NOTE POST #1 **

Duggie2012 wrote: »

Why are people running to the shops todays ffs. Its not the outback.

I wouldn't underestimate the ability of relatively small falls of snow in this part of the world to cause very significant disruption and inability to get to the shops.

1. Lack of snow equipment as it doesn't snow very often.

2. No snow chains or winter tyres fitted makes driving very hard.

3. Ireland's not very cold, so you get to that level where you've often got ice that's barely ice or compacted snow. It's not that kind of dry very frozen powder you get in most of North America or parts of the continent that are much colder and see regular snowfall. It's not ice that's slippy, it's the very fine layer of water that forms on the top of it when the friction of your foot or tyre melts a very thin layer at the surface and you go sliding across the ice.

Our temps are closer to a fridge than a freezer.

In very cold climates, you can actually drive quite reasonably on ice as it's extremely frozen. In Ireland it's more like the perfect conditions created for ice skating on a rink!

This isn't a snowy region and it has impacts here that are not likely to be found in regions that are colder and get more regular falls as a result.

I wouldn't be too sneering about people making preparations for bad weather.