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XXY. 
SOME EE CENT STOEMS AND FLOODS IN HEETFOEDSHIEE. 
By John Hopkinson, F.L.S., F.G.S., F.R.Met.Soc., Assoc.Inst.C.E. 
j Read at Watford, 1 6 th December, 1902 . 
Since 1894 there has not been a year with the rainfall 
appreciably above the average, and with the exception of the years 
1896 and 1901 it has been deficient; nor have we recently had 
any gale nearly so destructive as that of the Spring of 1895. All 
the storms of sufficient severity to he recorded have been noticed in 
my annual meteorological reports, hut a few have occurred in 
recent years, notwithstanding the generally small rainfall and 
absence of severe gales, which should perhaps he more fully 
recorded in our ‘ Transactions.’ 
Accounts of these have appeared in our county newspapers, 
and I think that the prompt publication of such accounts of 
meteorological phenomena which they are able to give is much 
to he commended and encouraged, no apology being needed for the 
statement that by far the greater part of the following account of 
these storms is derived from our local Press. Some details of 
ephemeral or personal interest, not unworthy of record at the time, 
are here omitted. 
The Snow-storms and Floods of February, 1900.—The heavy falls 
of snow on the 3rd, 10th, and 13th of February have been alluded 
to on a preceding page (p. 68), but no account is there given of 
the results of these snow-storms. Of the first there is nothing of 
importance to record, hut it was partly owing to the depth of snow 
remaining on the ground from that fall that the results of the later 
falls were so serious, especially the floods which resulted from 
a heavy fall of rain and rapid thawing of the snow on the frozen 
ground. 
The snow of Saturday the 10th drifted to a great depth in places, 
and the snow-storm on the evening of Tuesday the 13th, being 
accompanied by such a high wind that it has been called a blizzard, 
added greatly to the depth of the drifts, which blocked many of 
our roads and some of our railways. On Wednesday morning, on 
the Hitchin and Cambridge line a train stuck fast in a drift 
between Ashwell and Baldock, and no train got through to 
Cambridge until about half-past 10. The branch line from 
St. Margaret’s to Buntingford was blocked by snow-drifts on 
Tuesday night, and it was not until noon on Wednesday that 
traffic could he resumed. The block on the line from Luton to 
Dunstable was the worst yet experienced. Gangs of men from 
the various stations on the line were hard at work clearing it from 
3 a.m. to 2.30 p.m., when the first passenger train was got 
through. In some districts the mails were much delayed; the 
rural postman from Welwyn had twice to dig himself out of the 
