Heavy snow closes airports, schools across Britain

LONDON, Jan. 6 -- The bad weather that struck Scotland and northern England earlier this week rolled into the south and London in early Wednesday, causing delays and cancellations of public transport and closing thousands of schools across the country.

A man walks through the snow in Queen's Park in northwest London, January 6, 2010. Blizzards swept across central and southern England on Wednesday, bringing more road and rail chaos, forcing airlines to suspend flights and hundreds of schools to close.

Temperatures were as low as minus 13 degrees Celsius in northern Scotland, and snowfalls reached 25 cm in parts of the southern county of Hampshire, but London largely escaped the worst of the snow.

In London, the trains heading to Kent, parts of Sussex and the London suburbs from the major commuter stations of London Bridge, Charing Cross, Waterloo East and Cannon Street were all suffering from delays and cancellations.

An emergency timetable with dozens of canceled services and many re-timed ones had been in operation all day and will run for Thursday and probably Friday. Train services that usually operated past midnight were scheduled for last trains between 7 pm and 9 pm.

The overcrowded conditions on trains made many commuters unable to get off at their destinations and had to continue their journeys till the next stop, while others who got off to allow passengers to leave the train couldn't return onto the carriage.

"Just my luck, I stopped commuting like this in 1991 and just came into town today on business. Now I'm stuck in this. I wouldn't like to do it every day," a traveler told Xinhua.

Other commuters made light of the delays and crowded trains. Darren Jones, aged 21, an office worker in London who lives in Dartford said: "It's a bit like that game tetris innit? You kind of have to move people into funny shapes and sideways and everything to get them to fit in."

Janice Ackerley, living in the southeast of London, said while it was crowded and there were delays it was better than in previous heavy snowfalls. "Back in February last year we had more snow and it was much worse. Things just seemed to grind to a halt."

Passengers wait for flights after heavy snowfall closed the runway at Gatwick Airport near London January 6, 2010. Blizzards swept across central and southern England on Wednesday, bringing more road and rail chaos, forcing airlines to suspend flights and hundreds of schools to close.

Gatwick airport canceled flights for most of the day. It could reopen before 5 p.m. Airport spokesman Sean McKe said, "We hope to be open Thursday. One fear is that ice will form with the water, but we have plans for that. We have teams out working on the snow as I speak."

"We lost 438 flights and we are dealing with the backlog. The public has been very understanding, which we didn't expect, and they've been resilient."

At Heathrow Airport the runways remained open. "We have a team of 68 vehicles - snow ploughs and gritters - operating to keep the runways open," airport spokesman Stuart Butchers.

"We have had 150 cancellations out of a daily total of 1,300 flights. We expect to stay open Wednesday and all Thursday and we are not expecting any more snow until Friday.

"This is nowhere near as bad as the heavy snowfall we had in February 2008. That was a bad day for us and we had 800 cancellations."

London's subways were largely running normally. A Transport for London spokeswoman said, "Most Tube lines had a good service, with some minor delays, in both the morning and evening."

Outside London in southern England the snow was deeper and more disruptive. A total of 70 schools in the small, coastal county of Dorset, were closed.

Snow falls around The Houses of Parliament in central London January 6, 2010.

Hundreds of schools in the north of England including Plymouth Grove Primary School in central Manchester were forced to close on Wednesday because of the weather.

Head teacher Michael Cooke said: "School will be closed on Thursday. I apologize for the further inconvenience that this causes children and parents but we have been unable to clear any of the snow, or grit any of the paths.

"The school has also been unable to receive any food deliveries for the school dinners. We are making every effort to have this work completed by Friday."

Greater Manchester Police (GMP) reported the snow had helped them make several arrests. A GMP spokesman said: "Officers arrested two men for trying to break into vehicles parked on driveways after following their footprints in the snow.

"Another wanted offender was put behind bars after his footprints led officers to the house where he was hiding."