Blizzard causes New Year travel misery in Beijing
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Beijing was hit by its heaviest single daily snowfall for nearly 60 years on Sunday, crippling transport networks and leaving thousands of air passengers stranded. Over 12.6cm was dumped on the Chinese capital by Sunday morning, with flurries continuing to blow in throughout the day. The snowfall in Beijing set a daily record since 1951, Xinhua reported China’s National Meteorological Center as saying.
At Beijing Capital International Airport, 491 flights were delayed and 756 flights cancelled as of 9pm on Sunday night. Only one of the three runways at the airport remained open. One of those affected by the snow was TDA’s Editor-in-Chief, Mark Elliott, who reported that as snowfall continued throughout the day, airport workers facing a mounting battle to clear snow from runways, aprons and planes. Several planes taxied for take-off with snow still visible on fuselages, despite long de-icing efforts. Fortunately the planes’ wings appeared to be free of snow and ice at the time of take off.
Drivers faced treacherous conditions on Beijing’s roads, including the main airport expressway, with several cars being left stranded at the roadside. Lanes were reduced to narrow passages of brown slush between increasing high curbside drifts. Despite a Xinhua report that 300,000 people had been mobilised to clear the snow, there was no evidence of and gritting on major roads by 2pm on Sunday. The BBC reported that airports in the nearby cities of Tianjin, Hohhot and Shijiazhuang were closed completely.
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