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London North Western
Railway:
Midland
Railway:
Stratford
Midland Junction Railway
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LMS Route: The Shakespeare Route
Kineton Station: smjk205
A pair of unidentified ex-LMS 4F 0-6-0 locomotives are seen
clearing snow in Kineton station during the winter in early 1947. The strangest
thing about 1947, was the first part of the winter was very mild, with only 2
failed cold spells...The weather in fact, turned unseasonably mild for a time.
On the 15th January, the temperature in Leeming, North Yorkshire, didn't fall
below 11.7 C, and rose to 14 C the next day in parts of Norfolk, Herefordshire,
and Flintshire. This soon changed. An area of High Pressure transferred north,
from France, on January 18th. Two days later, the anticyclone was centred over
North -West Norway. It then drifted South -East to Southern Scandinavia, and
dominated the UK weather for the rest of the month. The first frost came on the
20th, and the first snowfall on the 23rd, where heavy snow was recorded in the
South West of England, even the Scilly Isles. Many villages became cut off and
isolated.
The cold and snowy weather continued with any breaks
lasting only a very short time, before the next onslaught. On no day in
February 1947 did the temperature at Kew Observatory top 4.4C, and only twice
in the month was the night minimum temperature above 0 C. The mean maximum
temperature for the month was 0.5C (6.9C below average) and the mean minimum
was -2.7 C (4.6 C below average). On 26 of the month's 28 days, snow was lying
at 09:00 am south of a line from The Wash to the River Dee, mean maximum
temperatures were everywhere more than 5.5 C below average and, in some places,
more than 7 C below average. Mean minimum temperatures were more than 4 C below
average everywhere in the south and south-west of England, and almost 6 C below
average in some places. February 1947, was the coldest February on record in
many parts of the UK, and has been compared with 1814 (January) for its
persistent snowfalls, combined with low temperatures.
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