Blog: So you think this is cold, do you?
[gallery] It's the arrogance of the age that we always think we're special, or enjoying/suffering special weather, the best/worst since records began, writes Toby Neal. The present cold snap has nothing on the winters of 1947 and 1963.
Phew! What a scorcher!
Whaddya mean, you think it's parky?
Some folk don't know that they're born, writes Toby Neal.
It's the arrogance of the age that we always think we're special, or enjoying/suffering special weather, the best/worst since records began.
Turn back the clock, and not all that far (unless you're under 30), to December 12, 1980. Between 6am and 9am temperatures recorded by Shawbury Met Office fell to minus 22.3C (minus 8.6F), the lowest since records began in 1958.
Then Lilleshall weatherman John Warner recorded minus 25C (minus 13F) during the night of December 12/13, and around lunchtime on Sunday, December 13, a blizzard started in Shropshire in which between 8ins and 12ins of snow fell.
It was the coldest December since 1890, and a combination of cold and snow not exceeded since 1878.
January 10, 1982, saw the lowest temperature ever recorded in England - minus 26.1C (minus 15F) at Harper Adams College, near Newport.
And we're not even going to mention the winter of 1962-63.
Oh all right then, we are.
Christmas Day, 1962, was the coldest on record at minus 10C. There were blizzards on Boxing Day. In January and February 1963 there was a continuing big freeze with sub-zero temperatures day and night. The River Severn at Shrewsbury froze over and people went skating on it.
Going back yet further, February and March 1947 saw the worst blizzards for many years. Roads were blocked and villages isolated. In fact, in parts of south Shropshire, roads simply disappeared and the only way to get about was on foot or by horse.
The Rev William Tavernor, the vicar of the parishes of Bettws-y-Crwyn (1,300ft above sea level), and Newcastle-on-Clun (700ft above sea level), was unable to use his car for 12 weeks.
He recalled that the local postman carried a long pole. With the snow in many places being over 6ft deep and frozen on top, his plan was that if he suddenly disappeared he would put his hat on the pole and wave it above the snow hoping that somebody would see it.
What we must remember too is that back then many people did not have telephones, and they would have had coal fires rather than central heating.
So when it comes to the present cold snap, the veterans of 1947 and 1963 might ask what we're all complaining about.
And they do!
