Snow havoc moving to North and West

Feb 3 2009

The snowstorms which devastated travel networks in the South on Monday are spreading to the North and West of the UK.

Forecasters expect Scotland, Wales and northern England to suffer the most from the wintry weather. Children across Britain are likely to get another day off school.

The Met Office has issued an extreme weather warning to motorists across the UK to beware of icy roads and drifting or heavy snow.

But the main rail routes into London should be working, a spokesman for the Association of Train Operating Companies (ATOC) said. Although in the Pennines, Yorkshire and Northumberland, snow ploughs were on standby amid fears those areas would see a worsening of the weather.

The Atoc spokesman said being able to get staff to locations where they were needed was central to a successful response. He said: "Gone are the days when people lived in railwaymen's cottages by the line."

He added that some staff were being brought in from holiday to help with the work.

A spokesman for Network Rail said there would be "a much better service" into London. He said: "We still expect there will be some delays to services in the morning because, as with driving on the road, train drivers will take extra care in hazardous conditions, otherwise trains can slip and slide through stations and through red signals."

A Transport for London (TfL) spokesman said: "We're doing the best we can. What's really important is to check before you travel on www.tfl.gov.uk and on radio stations."

A British Airways spokesman said as a result of planes being diverted away from Heathrow on Monday due to the weather "we have aircraft in different places".

"There will be some disruption as a result of that. It takes some time to get aircraft where they should be. We're doing all we can. Every airline operating from Heathrow will have some disruption."