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BBC Weatherman, David Braine, writes:
Recently we've had much talk of climate change and global warming,
yet just 40 years ago - when I was just a few weeks old - the South
West was gripped by the worst winter since records began (dating back
to 1700).
My father reminded me just recently of that year, and of the need
to keep a coke brazier going, outside near the cold water taps, to
prevent the mains water supply from freezing.
It's estimated that a winter this severe only happens once every 250
years.
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| Scraping
the ice and snow from a road sign for Honiton |
Nineteen-sixty-three
was the only time this century that there were two consecutive months
with temperatures averaging below zero. Before that it was the winter
of 1878-79, and before that, the even more severe winter of 1740.
The winter of '62-'63 was the coldest winter on record with an average
temperatures throughout the winter of -0.3C.
High
pressure:
The big freeze started just before Christmas '62. The weather
in the first three weeks of December was changeable and sometimes
stormy.
The situation changed markedly on 22 December.
On
the
23rd, high pressure extended all the way from the southern Baltic
to Cornwall, bringing cold easterly winds to much of England and
Wales. With high pressure to the north and east of the British Isles
bringing bitterly cold winds from the east day after day, the temperatures
gradually lowered.
Then a blizzard over South West England on the 29th and 30th of
December brought snowdrifts 6m (18ft) deep.
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| This
goods train became stuck in the snow on Dartmoor and had to
be dug free |
Villages
were cut off (some for several days), roads and railways were blocked,
telephone wires were brought down, stocks of food ran low and farmers
couldn't reach their livestock.
Thousands of sheep, ponies and cattle starved to death on Dartmoor
and Exmoor.
Blizzard conditions:
There was snow cover across most of the South West from December
26th for 67 consecutive days.
On the 3rd and 4th of January a tremendous blizzard took place.
Drifts of snow were up to 5m (15ft)deep, and there was 10-20 cm
of fresh level snow in places, accompanied by a strong and penetrating
wind giving night time temperatures as low as -10C.
Much of Devon, Dorset and Somerset were paralysed and all train
and road services ground to a halt.
By the 15th of January the winds became northerly again, however
many places still managed to stay beneath freezing.
Winds turned easterly again on the 17th for the most severe week
of the winter. From the 18th to the 21st of January easterly winds
brought the snow back with a vengeance.
There was a snowdrift 8m (25ft deep) on Dartmoor on the 21st.
Frozen seas:
There was much freezing fog on the 24th and, for or the first time
since 1947, there was pack ice on large estuaries such as the Severn,
and the Exe.
Thousands of sea birds died because of the low temperatures and
marine life in general suffered.
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| Even
the sea was frozen in some places, this picture was taken in
East Devon |
Just
over the border in Lyme Regis the sea had started to freeze, and
further east in Eastbourne the sea actually froze over for several
days.
Many harbours and estuaries in the South West were frozen until
the end of the month when temperatures slowly began to rise.
One consequence of the prevailing easterlies was that some sheltered
westerly locations were very sunny, St Mawgan in Cornwall reached
a record 114.4 hours for the month.
Then in early February, still with several feet of lying snow, another
snowstorm hit the South West.
This gave another 3 feet of snow on the 6th and 7th, the last big
dump of snow before the thaw.
By the 4th of March most of the snow had gone and for the first
time since December 26th, 1962, the temperatures crept above freezing.
I was just three months old!
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