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BBC, 2/2/09

“Heavy snow has fallen across large parts of England, disrupting travel and closing hundreds of schools.

South-east England has the worst snow it has seen for 18 years, causing all London buses to be pulled from service and the closure of Heathrow runways.

Road and rail travel was also badly hit by up to 6in (15cm) of snow.

The Met Office has issued an extreme weather warning for England, Wales and parts of eastern Scotland. More snow is forecast later and on Tuesday.

Thousands of school children across England woke up to the news their school was closed for the day.

In Essex more than 450 are shut and 255 Berkshire schools are now closed. Leicestershire and Rutland gave pupils at 200 schools the day off.

Hundreds more are closed across north-east England, East and West Sussex, Kent, Norfolk Cambridgeshire, Lincolnshire and Suffolk where snow-ploughs were out on the county’s roads for the first time in more than 15 years.

Bad weather in London also forced the closure of the Old Bailey courts.

Air travel has been badly affected…

The Highways Agency said there have been too many minor accidents on the roads “to put a number on”.

The agency recommended people should only make essential journeys.

BBC weather presenter Jay Wynne said further snow showers were expected during the morning across much of England, eastern parts of Wales and eastern parts of Scotland.

Temperatures in the afternoon would not reach above freezing, he said.

In the late afternoon, more heavy snow is forecast to hit the eastern part of England, including East Anglia, London and the Home Counties, accompanied by “strong winds, blizzard conditions”.

This will work its way up through the Midlands, northern England and eastern Scotland.

Evening temperatures will fall to about -1C for many areas of England and eastern Wales, with the weather turning icy by Tuesday morning making road travel treacherous.

There will be minor snowfalls and temperatures will reach about 4C in most areas by Tuesday afternoon.

One motorist, driving in the Midlands on Monday, told the BBC conditions were much clearer there, but highway officers told him they had responded to 1,735 incidents over a 24-hour period in the East Midlands alone…”