Heavy snow disrupted air and rail travel in Europe on on Monday, halting flights at London's main airport entirely and bringing traffic in the British capital almost to a standstill. Tens of thousands of commuters were advised not to attempt the journey into work in London, experiencing some of its worst snow in almost 20 years. Buses were cancelled altogether and hundreds of schools were closed across the country, leaving children to play and build snowmen in parks and gardens. “I'd rather be sledging than at school,” said 7-year-old Georgie Cunliffe, who was playing in a London park. Conditions familiar to eastern Europe and other northerly countries notoriously pitch Britain into chaos, its infrastructure ill prepared for the cold. In northern France as well, snow blanketed Paris and surrounding countryside and brought major air, rail and road systems to a halt. London business leaders said the estimated cost to the British capital alone could be as much as $69 million in lost productivity. All flights in and out of Heathrow were cancelled. Highway authorities warned of hazardous driving conditions in southern and central England. A Cyprus Airways jet at Heathrow slipped off a taxiway after arriving but came to a safe halt. No-one was hurt. Britain's Met Office issued a “severe weather” warning for large parts of the country, with weather experts saying south east England was experiencing some of its worst snow since the early 1990s with many parts of the country being covered by 15cm of snow. In France, flights were delayed by an average of an hour in Paris's airports. One of two runways w closed, and the other opened two hours late. Air France cancelled around 30 short and medium haul flights from Charles de Gaulle between 7:00 A.M. and 10:00 A.M., but said long haul routes had not been troubled. France's road traffic agency urged motorists to cancel non-essential journeys, with roads difficult and in a small number of some cases impassable around Paris and in the east near Strasbourg. The snow and icy conditions caused a dozen accidents in the Paris region without causing injuries, officials said. In Italy, three people died and 500 people had to be evacuated from their homes Sunday amid bad weather in parts of the country, while Milan woke Monday to a dusting of snow. Up to 20cm also fell in parts of Switzerland overnight while part of the road around the San Bernardino tunnel was closed. One to 3cm of snow fell in Belgium, where around 400 km of traffic jams accumulated during the morning peak hour. “The forecasted rain and snow will turn our roads into ice rinks,” Belgium's touring automobile association said. Snowfalls snarled traffic in several parts of Spain including the Madrid area where sections of two highways were temporarily closed to vehicles, causing traffic jams, the National Travel Administration Department (DGT) reported.
