No response.
She grasped his chin and turned his face to meet hers. Doris stepped back in shock. She’d seen many dead bodies in her time but was unprepared for this.
She stepped forward and checked his bed mate. Frozen to death as well.
‘Oh, God’ she whispered. Doris looked over at her colleague who still hadn’t stirred. So, she moved to the next bed and the next and the next…..
Within two or three minutes, she had learned the worst. Twelve of the aged patients were dead, as was one of the nurses.
Staff Nurse Ekins sat down on the edge of a bed, head in hands. She had never felt so alone in all of her days.
Day 2 – Hull, East Yorkshire – 3:00pm
Fay Gough tried the telephone one more time. She’d been at the shoe shop where she worked since 8.45am and hadn’t served a single customer all day.
Fay had let herself into the small side street shoe shop with the set of keys that Mr Shapiro let her keep. Shapiro, the owner, relied heavily on Fay to run the small business – one of many in which he had an interest. She more or less ran the day-to-day operations, yet Mr Shapiro would always call in at around 5pm and cash up. He didn’t trust her that much – he didn’t trust anybody that much!
She had been sitting impatiently watching the snow pile up all day and was not at all surprised that no one had entered to contemplate buying a pair of shoes. The two shops either side of her - a cake shop and a barber - were already closed, and she really didn’t know why she was still at work. However, Mr Shapiro was insistent and inflexible. She should never close the shop without checking with him first. Yet she had been unable to contact the owner all day and she was now becoming apprehensive. The shop was cold and she wanted to get home to the warmth of her flat, which was only half a mile up the road.
She really didn’t think that anyone was going to buy anything today. In fact the snowstorm outside was so bad, she hadn’t actually even seen anyone for several hours. Consequently, she made a bold decision. She was cold and hungry and was going home. Mr Shapiro would surely understand when she explained the situation. Anyway, Fay was past caring now!
She checked that all was in order within the shop, locked the till and secured all the windows and doors. Snow had drifted up against the back entrance, so she would have to leave by the front anyway. She put on her coat, scarf, hat and boots, looped her handbag around her neck and went to exit the shop.
Unfortunately for Fay, the front entrance opened outwards and drifting snow had piled up against the glass frontage. She pushed hard against the drift but couldn’t budge the door even an inch. She tried using her shoulder in a vain attempt to force a gap just large enough for her to squeeze out.
No luck!
To make things worse, as she pushed against the door a large clump of snow on the porch roof loosened and fell to the floor increasing the drift threefold. There was now definitely no way out via the front door, and the storm outside continued unabated.
Fay was now getting annoyed and just a little bit frightened. She ran through the shop to the rear door. She fumbled with the keys and unlocked the door. But this damned exit opened outwards as well. She had the same problem – the door was completely blocked by drifting snow.
She now started to panic.
Fay ran back to the front and carefully assessed the situation. The blizzard was raging fiercely outside, but there was a possible way out. The main shop window was of plate glass, and although snow was piled half way up against it, if she could smash the glass and create a big enough hole, she could escape through it. It was a risky enterprise, fraught with danger but her choices were now limited. There was no-one local she could ring – even if her phone was working.
She quickly cleared the shoes from the shop window space and flung them unceremoniously into the shop. She was beyond caring by now.
But what could she break the glass with? It was old glass – she knew that – because there was a small crack in one corner and old Mr Shapiro had been meaning to replace the entire window with modern security glass for several years, but had never got round to it.
Fay looked round the shop for something heavy. She spotted a heavy wooden chair, which customers used for trying on shoes. It was small and old but she quickly grabbed it, hauled it above her head and flung it with all her might against the old window.
It bounced.
However, a small crack appeared down the length of the glass from the corner as the chair dropped to the ground.
Fay picked it up again, and holding it by the backrest, swung the chair with all her might against the glass.
Success!
The glass smashed and large shards of glass came crashing down all around her. She jumped back automatically and fell to the shop floor. But, joy of joys, a large hole big enough for her to get through had appeared. She stood up and putting on her gloves, approached the broken window. It was an uneven break, with shards hanging pell-mell along the top. Fay tested a few to make sure that they were secure. A couple came loose and fell into the snow, which now came driving into the shop through the breach.
Fay realised that she would have to throw caution to the wind if she was to escape before the snow completely blocked her path. So she gingerly raised her left leg and put it through the gap. She bent down low to avoid the glass from above her, and moved her slender frame and right leg into the full force of the storm. As she did so, a large shard loosened itself, fell and buried itself perilously close to Fay’s head. She instinctively ducked and fell sideways into the drift. She lay prostrate for thirty seconds just relieved to be out of the shop, but was quickly being enveloped in snow. She must move out onto the road. But there was so much snow and it was falling so rapidly that she had become disoriented. She used her arms to push herself up out of the drift and as she did so, a large lump of snow, disturbed by the breaking glass perhaps, freed itself, slid off the top floor roof and cascaded down onto the unfortunate shop assistant who was literally buried alive.
No one saw it happen and there was no one around to help or save her.
Day 2 – Grantham, Lincolnshire – 3:00pm
The council storage depot, which lay in a compound just off the A1 junction with the A52, was full of grit. There were mountains of it.
The gritting lorry drivers just hadn’t had the opportunity to drive out of the depot and get it laid. Linda Morris, the duty supervisor responsible for co-ordinating grit laying had been at work since Sunday night, making sure that grit lorries were out as soon as the snow started falling. However, the force of the snow and the associated traffic accidents that blocked just about every road had prevented the lorries from doing their job. Half of the drivers and their loads were simply stuck in traffic – like many hundreds of thousands of other motorists.
Linda had relocated to the depot early on Monday morning to supervise operations personally. She’d had to walk the last half-mile because the A52 was already blocked. She found a disparate group of drivers waiting to set off in fully loaded lorries, but with no exit route from the compound. The A1 was clogged and traffic was nose to tail up to the turn-off and was blocking the exit. Many cars had already been abandoned.
By midday, she had realised that her task was hopeless. Traffic and snow precluded any further grit laying operations. In any case it was a forlorn task. There was just too much snow. Therefore, she sent the drivers home and closed the compound down. As she did so, she imagined that this must be happening all over the country. The UK gritting system was wholly inadequate for such conditions. However, what was the solution? Spending £millions on equipment that may never be used or just gamble that the worst may never happen? As usual, the politicians fudged the decision.
Well, the worst had happened. Linda locked the main gates, put the depot keys into her bag, set off up the road between the abandoned cars and tried to get home. There was absolutely nothing else she could do.
Day 2 – Central London – 4:00pm
Quincey Robe
rts was just about out on his feet. So was his small team of technicians and programme assistants. He had actually been speaking to the Prime Minister less than thirty minutes before, when the line suddenly went dead. Shortly afterwards, the power in the studio failed, and he now sat in darkness with the ever increasing cold.
The whole crew was in the same room, huddled together trying to keep warm. There would be no further transmissions.
Day 2 – 10 Downing Street – 4:00pm
The Prime Minister was sitting in the gloom of the emergency lighting provided by the independent generator in Downing Street.
He was a broken man. The occupants of numbers 10 and 11 Downing Street had been assembled and herded down into the depths below street level. Many were busying themselves with the small tasks necessary to set up the emergency accommodation provided for the PM and his entourage, should disaster strike the UK.
Not many of these people considered themselves fortunate. They had been brought together by the storm raging above, and wished that they could be at home with their loved ones – whatever the hardship involved. However, there was no chance of that in the short term. The best that they could hope for was to sit it out in Downing Street until the snow stopped.
The Prime Minister was helpless. Although he had some communication facilities, there were precious few people he could contact. Everyone in the country was now in a real-life survival situation.
It was truly, and unthinkably, every man for himself.
Day 2 – Situation Report – 6:00pm
The snow had been falling for less than 24 hours.
However, the ferocity and relentlessness of the storm had caught everyone on the hop. Of course, during every wintertime in the UK, one area or another would be hit by freak storms, floods, wind or snowfall, causing untold but only provincial and short-term damage. It would affect relatively few people and as the snow receded, the general population would quickly return to normality, silently thanking the Gods that this time they were spared too much inconvenience or damage.
Naturally, the Press loved it! People in the south of England could not readily empathise with six-foot drifts in the Highlands of Scotland, or five metre floods in Devon. Moreover, of course, it was the government in the south of England that made all of the financial decisions. Why should they spend millions of pounds on legislating for ‘freak, one-off’ incidents? They could set up disaster funds for those affected and surely the insurance companies would pay out – eventually. That’s what insurance companies were for – wasn’t it? But of course, not everybody had insurance – or indeed could even get it in vulnerable areas. There were 200,000 householders in the UK that simply couldn’t get insurance for their homes because of the location of their properties!
Every year the papers bleated about the inability of the elected administration and infrastructure to cope with snowfall, and every year it would all be quickly forgotten as the sun came out and melted that same snow.
Britain would just have to cope, as it always did. If a few hundred people suffered, then that was just their bad luck. The money could be far better spent on health and education – or MP’s expenses!
However, the current storm was significantly different. If the UK tottered after one minor snowfall lasting a few hours, then it was no surprise that total chaos reigned after one day of constant snowfall in blizzard conditions.
All travel was now virtually impossible. Road, rail, tube, sea and air. The UK was, in effect, cut off. Those who assumed they could heroically struggle into work had long since discarded sledges and skis.
Many thousands of motorists were trapped in their vehicles and would inevitably freeze to death when their fuel ran out, or they would die trying to walk home – as all but a few motorists were wholly unprepared for such conditions. It didn’t matter how many times the authorities advised people to prepare for the cold – they just didn’t heed the warnings and now many thousands were paying the ultimate price.
The emergency services were crippled. Their personnel were in exactly the same situation as everyone else. People involved in accidents died where they fell, since no help was ever coming because ambulances, fire tenders and police cars were stuck in traffic. 999 emergency calls soon went unanswered. Domestic and industrial fires went unquenched and spread unchecked because there were no fire fighters available.
Hospitals and care homes for the elderly were cut off. As power failed, the patients froze. The elderly living home-alone stood no chance.
Re-supplies to shops were non-existent. Delivery lorries were stuck in snow. - their drivers freezing. Access to shopping centres and superstores was all but impossible as drifts soon blocked entrances – and exits!
The workplace was virtually empty. Only a small percentage of determined but foolhardy people had reached work and they were now struggling to survive or get back home. Industry had ground to a standstill. Work had quickly taken second place to personal survival. Schools were closed and children who had managed to make it in were now confined with beleaguered teaching staff.
The government was stymied. As luck would have it parliament was dissolved pending a new administration. The PM was caught in Downing Street with no way to organise relief. His advisors were spread throughout the country facing their own personal crises. Help from abroad was impossible, as communications were just about gone.
Communications were indeed quickly breaking down. Across the country, power cables were breaking under the strain of wind and snow. More importantly, drifting snow was blocking ventilation outlets on masts across the country. As a consequence, communication masts – for TV, radio and mobile phones were ceasing to function. Moreover, of course, there was no one willing or able to repair them.
Power stations were under pressure as well. Understaffed – routine maintenance was not being completed and slowly but surely the power output was being interrupted. The same applied at gas outlets. A few lucky people had LPG, but that would soon run out – or cease to function - if it wasn’t propane - in sub-zero conditions. Temperatures had now dropped to minus ten degrees C.
The primary problem was manpower. If people couldn’t - or wouldn't - travel to and from work, then essential maintenance and standard daily scheduled operations could not take place. Mechanical and electrical failures were bound to occur sooner or later.
Even if the workforce could travel – it largely couldn’t care less about loyalty to their employers – they wanted to ensure the safety of their own person and their own families. Who could blame them?
Consequently, this was the situation just twenty four hours into a violent and sustained snowstorm in the UK. What would the next few days bring? It was rapidly becoming a life and death scenario. Many had already died.
No power, no heat or light, no water, no communications and no food?
And if the snow doesn’t stop – perhaps, no hope?
Day 2 – Grantham, Lincolnshire – 12.15pm
Brady and his new companion Jane Kelly walked away quickly from the public house, leaving the old lady’s dead body with the landlord. Both were beginning to realise the true severity of the storm and the polar conditions associated with it. The loss of Brady’s family had been a shock far more numbing than the deep, penetrating cold he was now suffering. He was in deep shock but adrenalin was keeping him functioning. The death of the old lady at the pub was almost a non-event compared to the tragedy of losing his wife and children. He was in automatic pilot and didn’t really know what to do next. He was vaguely aware of the woman trudging next to him, but really didn’t have any idea of where he was going or what his immediate future might bring.
‘Shouldn’t we do something about the old lady?’ shouted Jane against the violent wind blowing into her face.
‘Just exactly what can we do?’ Brady snapped back, ‘She’s dead, and so will we be if we don’t find shelter soon. Let’s get you to the Angel and Royal, and then you can let someone in authority know the circumstances if you really
want.’
Brady struggled through the snow and headed for the High Street. Jane followed although she knew the way; she thought it better if she stuck with this fellow. It wasn’t far to the Angel but she might need his help.
There were precious few people about. The odd pedestrian was fighting his or her way through the storm but no vehicles were moving. There were many abandoned but none were occupied. People living here were probably in range of their homes and had tried to walk to safety much earlier in the day. Consequently, they stumbled down the centre of the road – it was much easier to see where they were going.
Brady grabbed Jane’s hand – not out of affection but rather that he didn’t lose contact with her in the conditions. He pulled her jerkily up the High Street towards the hotel. It wasn’t a great distance but walking through nearly a foot of snow made life difficult. Most of the shops were already closed – or hadn’t even opened today.
Snow! The Series [Books 1-4] Page 14
