-11C
The temperature outside read at 8.5C this afternoon, and has now cooled to -11C. No doubt it’ll get even colder tonight, even though the bite in the air is incredibly sharp.
The Highlands remains frozen, but it looks like life is continuing as normal – school starts this week but I can’t find any of the local schools listed as closed for tomorrow.
There have been a lot of criticisms about gritting not being in play properly, but here’s a picture of Inverness from Allanfearn which shows even the salty mud flats have frozen.
That to me illustrates just how difficult current conditions are – which makes it feel all the more remarkable that the roads are still open and life continues on mostly unimpeded.
In the meantime, the impact of the artic weather isn’t over yet.
As has already been mentioned, some of the local roads have been quite badly damaged by ice, with a number of nasty potholes appearing.
My main concern at present, though, is flooding – in a region of Scotland where local flooding issues are a periodic problem, it’s worth noting that there’s a lot of ice on the ground, and that ice is holding a lot of water. Too fast a thaw and we could see rivers such as the Nairn, Findhorn, and Lossie swell up very fast.
In the meantime, I had a fright the other day – the power cut out. It’s then I found out the central heating depended on the electric supply and was seriously concerned about what to do if the power didn’t come back on.
Turned out it was an old kettle shorting out the fuse box, so that was quickly corrected.
While various people turn to criticism about how much gritting is being done, personally I’m extremely thankful that normal services – electricity, gas, and the internet – remain available and uninterrupted.
After all, so long as we can snuggle warm inside the freezing weather has a limited impact on quality of life, and I’m extremely grateful for the people working behind mains services for not letting the weather cause any real problems.
The severe cold has caused severe travel disruption – road, rail, and air. Snow and ice is a traditional problem with power transmission. I suspect some people are doing a very good – if thankless – job about it, but deserve due appreciation for it.
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