The big Freeze

摘要

It wasn't simply its harshness, it was the fact that it went on for so long. Not for the Britons of 40 years ago the sort of 'modern snow' that melts the next day . . . the winter they endured seized the country in its icy grip for almost three months. To railwaymen and passengers alike, it posed the most awful problems in just getting to work, let alone keeping the system going. The Railway Magazine stated in its March 1963 issue that for many parts of Britain, the conditions were "worse than any within living memory". It was certainly the coldest period since 1947 and the statistics speak for themselves: the average temperature for England and Wales during January 1963 was 5.3 degrees centigrade below average. In February, the mean temperature over the month was 4.5 degrees below normal. In many parts of the country, the scourge of frost reached almost biblical proportions through January and into February, when temperatures never rose above zero for 40 nights, and, more incredibly, 40 days!