Snow surprise – it's chaos

BACK in 1998, the Meteorological Office predicted that, as a result of climate change, Scotland would run out of snow. The Met Office's figures suggested that the onset of global warming would lead to increased precipitation over northern Britain. This would fall as heavy rain, rather than snow, because of an anticipated rise in air temperatures. The theory, tested on the Met Office's Cray computer, suggested snow falls in Scotland would shrink to a tenth of what they had been.

Yesterday Scotland was blanketed in white stuff that looked awfully like snow. As usual, this white stuff took everyone by surprise – though it had been predicted in The Scotsman the day before. Road traffic instantly slowed to a crawl, lorries jack-knifed and the ferry service between Aberdeen and the Northern Isles was cancelled. The temperature hovered around zero, not quite the – 89.6C once recorded at Vostok in Antarctica but enough to make Scots shiver.

We should remind ourselves it has been much worse. In Braemar in 1982 and at Altnaharra in Sutherland in 1995, the temperature dropped to – 27C, a UK record. We should also note that the average winter temperature in Scotland is actually three to five degrees above freezing. At the South Pole the summer temperature is a balmy – 28C. Remember that the next time that strange white stuff arrives.