Is the latest weather of snow consequence?
10 February, 2012 - 11:11 -- Joseph O'Leary
For the second time in a week, England has been hit with widespread snowfall, causing the usual disruption to roads, businesses and transport.
If any readers were left in any doubt about the conditions, they need only have turned to their newspaper of choice. The Sun, Express, Telegraph, Daily Mail, Independent and Guardian all covered the latest downfall.
Some of the reporting, as noted in the Sunday Times earlier this week, sparked particular controversy as columnists attempted to view the recent cold snap through the prism of climate change.
But how severe is the latest dump of snow?
The Met Office themselves provide a useful analysis of the causes behind the recent snowfall, and also provide data on the extremes of the weather across the country.
For the weekend snowfall, the most extreme snow depths across the country were recorded in Church Fenton (North Yorkshire) and Wattisham (Suffolk) at 15cm. Meanwhile the mercury in South Newington in Oxfordshire dropped the most, as the temperature for the previous night was recorded at -12.4 degrees celsius.
The Met Office will report after today on the depths of the most recent snow. We can, however, learn something about historical precedent as a means of evaluating how much snow is 'a lot' relatively speaking.
The Met Office provide historical data on snowfall, measured by how many 'days of snow' there have been by month. While this does not provide an account of snow depth, it is useful for assessing the prevalence of snow and providing the bigger picture:
Going further back in history however suggests much of the last decade has been relatively tame in terms of days of snow coverage. A Met Office report on the matter provides a useful context:
The extent of the most recent snowfall is yet to be discovered, and the Met Office will only publish their 'days of snow' data in six months' time.
Evidence suggests however that the heavy snow in 2010 was, by recent historical standards, farily atypical. In addition, previous decades showed more evidence of snowfall over more days.
Hence the recent snowfall has an extremely high bar to match if it is to be seen as anything more than ordinary.
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