I've been off duty in the Surrey area today (whizzing around all over the place, as it happens) and we've had the tiniest snow showers and barely so much as a dusting, despite prolonged and heavy snow falling in the surrounding areas. It has, however, been chucking it down with rain at times, with strong winds shaking the trees as well. All as forecast over the last few days, so no surprises, but not very scenic.
However, it's now bitterly raw outside, with very damp conditions combined with surface air temperatures being no higher than 0C, and the Met Office are also forecasting heavy sleet and snow showers tomorrow. With a reduced service due to engineering, some of the de-icer trains from the local yards are having to take diversionary routes and I would expect some routes to be affected by ice simply from the remaining moisture after the damp conditions, let alone the white stuff. All in all I can see hints of problems with the service tomorrow, especially if the forecast takes any sort of turn for the worse. Who knows, it could just be equipment reliability dropping a little, if the cold and rain makes something electronic that little bit more vulnerable, let alone the third rail hating cold weather as it does.
As much as possible is being done - there are some engineering crews working their socks off in adverse weather to complete tamping delayed by snow, or trying to concentrate on renewals whilst standing around in the muckiest weather. Not to mention my control room friends who are trying to keep all the points and conductor rails heated as efficiently as possible. I'll be out and about tomorrow on a particularly vulnerable couple of routes, and I'm sure everyone will try to help as best we all can, but one can never predict everything...
