East Sussex chills: the morning after the day before!

The eastern edge of the county seemed to get off relatively lightly yesterday compared to parts of west Sussex, Hampshire, Dorset and the west country which received heavy amounts of snowfall on Friday causing major disruption on the roads.

Even so, the snow meant 275 schools in Sussex closed at lunchtime on Friday, as headteachers decided to allow children and staff to get home safely.

However, it’s not over yet with temperatures in the region expected to remain close to freezing, made even more bitter by the easterly winds. There could be some snow flurries today, but nothing significant, with the biggest danger coming from ice.

BBC South East weather presenter, Kaddy Lee-Preston, said: “Ice is also a concern and surfaces will be prone to ice throughout the weekend. On Sunday, there is a weather system moving up from the continent which could give large amounts of snow. Details are difficult to pinpoint at the moment but it’s the type of situation where we could get five centimetres or more of snow.”

On the roads, with overnight road temperatures dipping to minus 3, East Sussex County Council’s gritters and their 27 trucks were out at 6am this morning working the county’s primary routes and snow routes.

Southern Rail warned this morning that there could be delays of up to 30 minutes on routes heading into London because of a broken down train which is causing disruption at Horsham. They are hoping to run a normal Saturday service today, although there will be some delays on routes because of improvement works.

Southeastern said that Network Rail de-icer trains have been running on the network throughout the day and additional Southeastern staff have been helping to clear snow from platforms and stairs. It was advising passengers to allow additional time for travelling.