Blizzard, Avalanche, Tempest

Manawatu Times, Volume 66, Issue 4, 6 January 1941, Page 5

Blizzard, Avalanche, Tempest

Bitter Weather Wracks Europe

60,000 CASES or INFLUENZA IN YUGOSLAVIA United Press Association—By Elective Telegraph—Copyright. Received Sunday, 7.20 p.m. LONDON, Jan. 4. Sixty thousand cases of inlluenza ase reported in Yugoslavia. There is another outbreak in Portugal as bitter weather wracks Europe from Scandinavia to Tangier and from the Atlantic to Siberia. Blizzard, avalanche and tempest are wrecking transport and piling new miseries on top of the eoal and food shortages for millions throughout the Continent, including British prisoners of war whose parcels are blocked on the roads and railways of Spain and France. The Danube is frozen solid and even in Spain many rivers are frozen over. Hungary, after the coldest December for 150 years, is lashed by rain, snow and sleet which is sweeping across Bulgaria and Rumania. Hoods threaten the Balkans in the wake of unusually severe avalanches.

Moscow recorded minus 25 degree* Fahrenheit with minus 29 further north. An avalanche at Prozor buried fourteen peasants, killing two. Snow has fallen in the Rhone valley continuously for 48 hours covering Lyons writh five feet of snow and stopping trains aud trams. An avalanche blocked the roads at Grenoble, while snow blanketed Vichy a foot deep. Most of Vichy’s hotels are closed owing to the shortage of coal and many restaurants are closed due to the shortage of supplies. Storms throughout Spain blocked the Pyrenees roads and dislocated the transport services. Arctic cold gripped Scandinavia where there were 86 degrees of frost, Stockholm recording 39 degrees. . . A Swedish motor schooner sank with a crew of six during a tempest in the Baltic.